MSc quant jobs

[shbro]

any related thoughts on this are welcome !

I was wondering why finance companies go for PhD's when they look for science majors. The mathematical knowledge for masters can sometimes be comparable to that of the PhD, depending on the coursework, projects involved and thesis. Personally I have an engineering background (masters in ECSE from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute) and recently I am considering a career in finance, partly because my family is relocating and partly out of curiosity to learn about finance ! My original plan is to pursue a PhD in the area of Machine Learning/pattern recognition/AI. But I am not sure how this could be relevant to a career in finance, so here are my questions

1. Are my research interests relevant at all to quant research? i.e. will the PhD help my career progress if I decide to stay in a career in finance? and is it realistic to work as a quant while doing my PhD?
2. with my masters, do I have any options finding a quant job? if so what type of quant jobs am I looking at? what are the hours and compensation like? and what are examples of employers?

 

[Canuck]

Is your masters relevant to finance?

 

[petercaya]

Hello Shbro,

I'm just starting to look for my way into this fascinating field myself. I recommend http://quantstart.com/. It's a very concise website.

From one of the articles on the site and from what I've heard elsewhere, a PhD in machine learning could be extremely useful in quantitative finance as it would show the knowledge and interest necessary to construct effective automated trading strategies although my knowledge doesn't go deeper than that.

 

[njindian]

Hello Shbro,

I'm just starting to look for my way into this fascinating field myself. I recommend http://quantstart.com/. It's a very concise website.

From one of the articles on the site and from what I've heard elsewhere, a PhD in machine learning could be extremely useful in quantitative finance as it would show the knowledge and interest necessary to construct effective automated trading strategies although my knowledge doesn't go deeper than that.

Hi Peter,

Thanks for the quantstart link. I found it to be very informative in terms of career opportunities for quants.

http://www.quantstart.com/articles/What-are-the-Different-Types-of-Quantitative-Analysts

Nitin