What Should I Aim For? Math undergrad at Cambridge

[mathmo]

Hi Everyone,

I am new to the QuantNet community and I must say I have found this website incredibly useful and informative. I am in the process of applying to MFEs and similar courses and I would like your opinion on my chances for admission in my target courses as well as ideas for other places to apply to.

Here is a brief summary of what I have done so far:

Cambridge University (UK) - Mathematics - upper 2nd (roughly 3.5/3.6 GPA)
This is arguably the toughest and most rigorous undegrad math course in the English Speaking world. Focussed on Analysis, Stats and Discrete Maths but I have obviously covered multivariate calculus, PDEs etc.. No electives are allowed so all my courses were maths and computation projects in C (did all of them). I never performed well enough in exams, as they were all concentrated during 1 week at the end of the year. I was always predicted 1st (or As) and I hope my recommendations show that.

Secondary School in Italy. Studied mostly Greek, Latin, Philosophy, History. Graduated with 100/100 and won a few math contests as well as qualifying to the nation math olympiad.

Exchange Program in Canada. Learnt English in one year ( I could not speak English till the age of 17 and now I am almost bilingual) and learnt 3 years worth of math in 1 (as my Italian school didn't offer advanced classes.). Took AP Calculus 5 among other Canadian exams.

GRE 780 (88%) (ouch) - 680 (96%) - 4.0 ( I sat this in Nov 09 thinking of applying to courses which did not consider it. hence never practiced a single one till actual exam).

Internship at P&G (FCMG) - A business Analyst role, technology-related.

1 year of full time work experience as a Business Intelligence Consultant. This involved data modelling, SQL, Configuration of Oracle Products and so on. I progressed quite fast within the small firm I work for, I manage a team of people and have gained significant experience.


I am considering applying to:
Columbia MFE (or MiF)
Stanford MS&E
Princeton MFin
UCB MFE
Cornell MFE
HEC (Managerial and Financial Economics)
Oxford MFE
NYU MFin


Do you think I have a shot at any of those schools or should I just wait one year, maybe leave my permanent employment for an internship within the financial sector , resit the GRE and try again the next?


Thank you for your help. I can see you are inundated by similar requests everyday and I would appreciate any time you spend reading the above.

 

[Barny]

First of all, you should probably drop the attitude wrt Cambridge and then making excuses for not being at the top. As a Cambridge alumnus, I can tell you that you probably shouldn't believe the hype and there are plenty of other courses comparable to a Cambridge Maths BA.

 

[martingaletrader]

mathmo drop the attitude of cambridge. I agree with Barny there are plenty of other good schools on par with Cambridge Math bachelors at the same level.

It is competitive but you should aim for all the top schools that you listed. You should stand a good chance of admitted. Some people at cambridge change from math tripos to engineering or econ - maybe you can do that if you are concerned about grades.

But ask yourself what you want after degree.

 

[DominiConnor]

I agree abut the attitude, quite odd, why do you need to tell us Cambridge is in the UK ?
BTW I'm not American like many here, this is not a cultural thing.

Why did you under achieve at exams ?
Be aware that to get a job, more exams are in your way including interviews where hard questions are asked.

You also ought to consider doing part III of the maths tripos for several reasons...
1: It's cheap.
2: it looks good on your CV
3: If you don't get accepted than this is a signal that you might not be right for this line of work.

 

[mathmo]

Thank you for the help. I did not mean to have a "Cambridge" attitude, I just wanted to provide some more info for students outside of the UK which might not have looked at the curriculum of the course specifically.

I "under achieved" in exams because, unfortunately, I did not exactly try hard at University. I decided not to do Part III and got a job due to personal reasons, I could have however being accepted and I was asked by my director of studies to take Part III. I might still do it if I do not get a place for an MFE.

Working for a year has been very benificial for me, I had somewhat lost my motivation and "drive" at Uni and I am now ready to put more effort in my career development. I have started applying for technology/infrastructure roles in quant hedge funds to at least get into the environment and I have a couple of interviews coming up. I am also studying from MFE textbooks to gain some more technical knowledge (Investments by Bodie,Kane,Markus among more general texts) and will probably do a C++ course (Baruch maybe?)


I guess I just wanted to know if I had a shot at top places this year and whether it was worth applying or not.

Sorry about the attitude! I really did not mean to, I am just proud of my alma mater.

 

[bigbadwolf]

I decided not to do Part III and got a job due to personal reasons, I could have however being accepted and I was asked by my director of studies to take Part III.

Can you get into the Part III with a mere upper second these days? Used to be you needed a first. Matter of fact I knew someone who got an upper second at Cambridge in math, got rejected for the Part III and ended up at Imperial -- a big step down.

 

[Barny]

Can you get into the Part III with a mere upper second these days? Used to be you needed a first. Matter of fact I knew someone who got an upper second at Cambridge in math, got rejected for the Part III and ended up at Imperial -- a big step down.

Cantab BA's have always been able to do part III with a 2:1. They're usually accepted to continue with part III if they get 65%+, without question. Even 60-65% is acceptable if your director of studies vouches for you. Everyone else is expected to get a first. Or if you're like my friend, 80% average.

 

[bigbadwolf]

Cantab BA's have always been able to do part III with a 2:1. They're usually accepted to continue with part III if they get 65%+, without question. Even 60-65% is acceptable if your director of studies vouches for you. Everyone else is expected to get a first. Or if you're like my friend, 80% average.

Though it has to be said that the part III courses are appreciably more difficult than the part II courses.

 

[Barny]

Though it has to be said that the part III courses are appreciably more difficult than the part II courses.

Not really true. I didn't think Part III was more difficult even than anything I did at Nottingham, and looking at the part II courses it seemed to be more of the same. The hard thing was the sheer volume of material they expect you to learn by pure rote. I took Quantum Field Theory and that was very easy - the exam was basically just a task of who can memorise the most book-work and regurgitate the most proofs. The only questions that required any thought were in general very poorly answered by the Cantab BA's. Frankly at the end of their degree they're able to learn a huge amount of material but are not able to think, which is why I rate Cambridge Maths as actually pretty average for turning you into a professional mathematician.

 

[quotes]

Considering your background, I would really suggest you drop the idea of being a derivative quant.
There are too many quants and MFEs nowadays to price financial derivatives.
Working in the financial business does not mean you need to know how to price derivatives, which is a small fraction of financial market.

If you would like to pursue career in finance, I recommend Econometrics and Statistics. Financial business craves for forecasting, which rely heavily on statistical forecasting. The biggest hedge fund Renanssence uses statistical models instead of derivative pricing to bet on the market! Soros uses economics and statistics and trading techniques to make money! Paul bet the mortage will collapse and made money during the crisis.

A derivative pricer, possibly a MFE background, serves the market like a dealer - you want to play Black Jack? I shuffle the card for you. The ones that make big money are in fact gamblers not arbitragers. They win due to sheer luck or correct forecast on future, not the techniques to serve cards. The card game may be complex and the dealer is paid more, and the card game may be standard and the dealer owns little. Besides, there are crowds of pre-dealers graduating from MFE programs!

If you are confident in you mathematical brain, stay away from derivative pricing and study statistics! That may grant you a fortune in ten years. Maybe you change your mind and become a respectful economist, who knows?

Check this on how a financial engineer make wages:
http://www.quantnet.com/day-life-emerging-market-trader/

 

[mathmo]

Thank you for your helpful suggestions.

Quotes, I have never mentioned the fact that I wanted to price derivatives. I would want to do an MFE because they teach a variety of modelling techniques, either PDE or Stats based, and they often offer the choice of taking some electives in Economics ( in particular I would want to get good foundations on Micro/Macro theory).

I do not expect the MFE to teach me everything I need to know for a job, if there was one way to do things I would not be interested in it. I am interested in a career in investment management.

 

[Andy Nguyen]

I would suggest that you research a bit more into the curriculum of the MFE programs. Most of them are still very focused on derivatives pricing and that has not been changed for years, even after the financial crisis. Some are very theoretical and do not teach you much practical skills that are being used in the real world.