What's it like working as a quant dev?

[usernamemuhahaha]

I'm a full-stack dev with 10yrs experience and a master's in math from one of the top schools. And am looking to make the switch from the Tech industry to finance.

Since I have a math degree, I figured a quant dev *might* be a good fit. So the first question is---what other roles are good for an experienced programmer with a strong math background?

The second question---for said role, what *specific* skills are used on a daily basis. And the last question, what does a typical day look like?

 

[KillingField]

Quant dev is just a dev and as such, a nebulous term: what is a typical day of a developer like? I've seen some people I know describe themselves as quant devs on LinkedIn, but what they really are doing is hooking Excel up to data sources and the analytics libraries written by the quants. Similarly true for people who write the core bits of the risk management engines: Again, nothing to do with maths, as it is pure tech, yet often branded as quant dev. Some people working in optimizing the PDE solvers etc call themselves quant devs, too, and this is a role where knowing some maths is indeed useful.

It's really difficult, I think, to get a good grasp of what a given role is like from the outside. I recommend you talk with recruiters to get a bit more color on what the teams you are interested in do do, and what they don't do.

 

[usernamemuhahaha]

@KillingField that's why i had asked "what other roles are good for an experienced programmer with a strong math background?"

 

[usernamemuhahaha]

@KillingField also, I was hoping some quant devs could share their experience here

 

[PepeQuant]

Go cash/E-trading quant. Math is less important than coding in liquid market.