MFE vs. Ph.D. in Finance

[_Chlorosaphir]

Hello everyone,

I just received an offer for Finance Ph.D. from a top-tier school; meanwhile I also received, and expect to receive, top-tier offers from MFE programs.

NOW here is the dilemma: shall I go for MFE or Ph.D. in Finance? My long-term goal, initial, is to become a Quantitative Researcher for a hedge fund or conduct independent research in the niche of asset pricing and quantitative investment. I also keep the door open to join academia, which is more research-oriented.

My questions are:

(i) What is the outlook for Ph.D. in Finance to join the finance industry, especially for hedge funds?
(ii) How competitive Finance Ph.D. is compared to a Ph.D. in Maths/Stats/OR?
(iii) Any general suggestions are warmly welcomed!

Would anyone offer me advice on this dilemma? Much appreciated!!!

 

[jarryds]

Hello everyone,

I just received an offer for Finance Ph.D. from a top-tier school; meanwhile I also received, and expect to receive, top-tier offers from MFE programs.

NOW here is the dilemma: shall I go for MFE or Ph.D. in Finance? My long-term goal, initial, is to become a Quantitative Researcher for a hedge fund or conduct independent research in the niche of asset pricing and quantitative investment. I also keep the door open to join academia, which is more research-oriented.

My questions are:

(i) What is the outlook for Ph.D. in Finance to join the finance industry, especially for hedge funds?
(ii) How competitive Finance Ph.D. is compared to a Ph.D. in Maths/Stats/OR?
(iii) Any general suggestions are warmly welcomed!

Would anyone offer me advice on this dilemma? Much appreciated!!!

If you want to go into quant, you must stick to STEM. A STEMless academic background won't be considered for most (and definitely all) jobs in quant.

 

[bfm.my]

I know a guy who did his Finance PhD at Duke. He joined Blackrock. Moved back to Asia several years later and joined firms like Barclays and CPP Investments.

 

[fkingloser]

Some people are mistaken that finance is not a stem, nor not mathematically rigorous. Actually it's wayyy much harder to get into top phd finance in US, and both more rigorous. (Assuming you are studying Deriv/Asset Pricing, Market Micro Structure, TIme MOdels, etc) I'm not sure which top school you are referring to, but assuming schools like princeton, columbia, etc, it's all about how well you conducted research. If you are not worried about opportunity costs, expenses of living, marriages, etc, I believe its good to take phd in finance.

My research professor at local uni got Phd finance in decent but definitely not top school(think of cornell, nyu, NW etc), went straightly to AQR as quant researcher before coming back to academia. Some of his other colleague also joined places like 2Sig, DE Shaw, Virtu, SIG. Don't think pursuing phd in top school will block you from joining these top quant firms.

 

[Qui-Gon]

Some people are mistaken that finance is not a stem, nor not mathematically rigorous. Actually it's wayyy much harder to get into top phd finance in US, and both more rigorous. (Assuming you are studying Deriv/Asset Pricing, Market Micro Structure, TIme MOdels, etc) I'm not sure which top school you are referring to, but assuming schools like princeton, columbia, etc, it's all about how well you conducted research. If you are not worried about opportunity costs, expenses of living, marriages, etc, I believe its good to take phd in finance.

My research professor at local uni got Phd finance in decent but definitely not top school(think of cornell, nyu, NW etc), went straightly to AQR as quant researcher before coming back to academia. Some of his other colleague also joined places like 2Sig, DE Shaw, Virtu, SIG. Don't think pursuing phd in top school will block you from joining these top quant firms.

Echo everything you say, except for the bit about NYU not being a top finance school. Stern is close to the top, along with Wharton, Booth, Columbia.

 

[_Chlorosaphir]

I know a guy who did his Finance PhD at Duke. He joined Blackrock. Moved back to Asia several years later and joined firms like Barclays and CPP Investments.

Wow that sounds great! Also it seems that Ph.D. are better treated in Asia in general, based on my preliminary understanding haha

 

[_Chlorosaphir]

If you want to go into quant, you must stick to STEM. A STEMless academic background won't be considered for most (and definitely all) jobs in quant.

Thanks! This is very helpful and I definitely agree that STEM is a great plus, if not a "must", for quant.

 

[_Chlorosaphir]

Some people are mistaken that finance is not a stem, nor not mathematically rigorous. Actually it's wayyy much harder to get into top phd finance in US, and both more rigorous. (Assuming you are studying Deriv/Asset Pricing, Market Micro Structure, TIme MOdels, etc) I'm not sure which top school you are referring to, but assuming schools like princeton, columbia, etc, it's all about how well you conducted research. If you are not worried about opportunity costs, expenses of living, marriages, etc, I believe its good to take phd in finance.

My research professor at local uni got Phd finance in decent but definitely not top school(think of cornell, nyu, NW etc), went straightly to AQR as quant researcher before coming back to academia. Some of his other colleague also joined places like 2Sig, DE Shaw, Virtu, SIG. Don't think pursuing phd in top school will block you from joining these top quant firms.

I can't agree more that finance is mathematically rigorous, especially that I would study empirical asset pricing as my potential niche/track. I am also planning to adopt most cutting-edge machine learning techniques to asset pricing, which I believe would involve extensive mathematical models, statistical tools, and computational instruments.

As for the top-ranking schools, I would like to further seek your view on UCB vs. UCLA vs. BC vs. BU. Any thoughts?

 

[fkingloser]

I can't agree more that finance is mathematically rigorous, especially that I would study empirical asset pricing as my potential niche/track. I am also planning to adopt most cutting-edge machine learning techniques to asset pricing, which I believe would involve extensive mathematical models, statistical tools, and computational instruments.

As for the top-ranking schools, I would like to further seek your view on UCB vs. UCLA vs. BC vs. BU. Any thoughts?

On that level, I think your supervisor and the Lab atmosphere, etc(anything related to the quality of PhD life) would be the priority factors that you should be considering.

But to give my personal ranking, I think there is a tier difference between the first 2 and the latter 2. UCB and UCLA are considered top, (if not, at least very solid) while later are close to solid, but not top

 

[CourantMathFinance]

It's pretty common to see PhDs in Finance working as quants in major firms.