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Looking for Career Advice

illhighlight

Joined
2/8/24
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I have recently graduated from a Mathematics degree in a top university in Ireland. I have landed a graduate job as a consultant at a professional services firm in the quantitative risk team starting later in the year.

In the next few years I plan to potentially do a masters at a top UK university in order to break into quantitative finance in London. I think I'd mainly be aiming for quantitative analyst roles at the big investment banks and hedge funds. I'm not too interested in HFT at the moment as I think I'm a slightly slower thinker and prefer complex problems that take a while. I'm looking for the mix between academia and real world problems while being able to use my technical/mathematical skills still.

The team I am joining does model development (IRB, IFRS9, Stress Testing, CECL etc), climate risk and valuations (derivatives, fixed incomes, options, swaps etc) as well as validation. I understand it's not directly related to the jobs I'm aiming for. I am trying to find what kind of experience I should be seeking in this job that will best align with my future goals in mind. Should I try to focus on building my network, maybe try ask to be involved with London based clients etc?
 
I would imagine that with a maths degree then Oxford, Imperial, Warwick might be good choices. In any case, it's a start.

edit: C++ and Python are useful skills.
 
Last edited:
Daniel Duffy said:
I would that with a maths degree then Oxford, Imperial, Warwick might be good choices. In any case, it's a start.

edit: C++ and Python are useful skills.
Click to expand...
Thanks for your reply. Oxford/Imperial are definitely on my radar for maybe 1-2 years time after getting some experience. When I start in my upcoming job do you thinks I'm best trying to get as much experience in derivatives, fixed income etc valuations as I can? It's often hard to understand what experience the BB banks and HFs value most. Their job postings in London for quant analyst positions seem quite vague.
 
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