Prospects of Being Hired at a Top Prop Firm

Hi, what are the chances of being hired by a top proprietary trading firm such as JSC if you are a graduate of a non Ivy League (or Ivy League comparable) university with a strong business school (ex. UC Berkeley, UCLA, UT Austin, CMU) and have a good GPA (>3.5)? To clarify, will any of the top firms even consider an application from graduates of these universities? If they do, what are top firms most interested in (ex. activites, internships, GPA, etc...)?

 

It is incredibly difficult to get interviews at most firms if you do not go to a school that is targeted. Business school wouldn't really matter. The non-Ivy schools that would be considered targets for prop trading firms would be:

-MIT -UChicago -Stanford -NYU -all the schools around Chicago (UIUC, UW-Madison, ND) -CMU

I've met one or two people from other schools you've mentioned, but it is the exception rather than the norm, mostly because the number of people hired each year is relatively low compared to other professions and there are many people at these other schools that are also interested. Find an alum and try to connect.

 
Jerome Marrow:
It is incredibly difficult to get interviews at most firms if you do not go to a school that is targeted. Business school wouldn't really matter. The non-Ivy schools that would be considered targets for prop trading firms would be:

-MIT -UChicago -Stanford -NYU -all the schools around Chicago (UIUC, UW-Madison, ND) -CMU

I've met one or two people from other schools you've mentioned, but it is the exception rather than the norm, mostly because the number of people hired each year is relatively low compared to other professions and there are many people at these other schools that are also interested. Find an alum and try to connect.

I'd add michigan and johns hopkins to that list

 
Bernankey:
Jerome Marrow:
It is incredibly difficult to get interviews at most firms if you do not go to a school that is targeted. Business school wouldn't really matter. The non-Ivy schools that would be considered targets for prop trading firms would be:

-MIT -UChicago -Stanford -NYU -all the schools around Chicago (UIUC, UW-Madison, ND) -CMU

I've met one or two people from other schools you've mentioned, but it is the exception rather than the norm, mostly because the number of people hired each year is relatively low compared to other professions and there are many people at these other schools that are also interested. Find an alum and try to connect.

I'd add michigan and johns hopkins to that list

Yeah, forgot to include Michigan with the Chicago area schools. They land a decent number at some places.

I've never met a John Hopkins alum anywhere, but who knows.

 

very very little chance. they won't even look at non-math/engineering/comp sci majors. Business school means jack shit.

The two superdays I had with top chicago firms in the last 2 months, they were completely populated by harvard/mit/princeton type grads, with a few illinios and CMU people in there, and I was the lone one from my university(BS/MS EE). Everyone have either a engineering/applied math/financial math/computer science degree.

 

Why would the quality of a university's business school matter? Skills developed in business school really have very little to do with quantitative trading.

Off the top of my head, Jane Street, IMC, Two Sigma, and D. E. Shaw (the latter two are hedge funds, but whatever) all recruit at Berkeley. Jim Simons has a doctorate from Berkeley, but I haven't seen any RenTech stuff around campus.

Don't believe everything you think.
 

Take these advices with a grain of salt.

I've interviewed with JSC with a 3.3ish GPA in a school not known for its engineering school. I also know people that majored in Business or Econ that got into top options market making companies, because you don't necessarily have to be "quanty" to do well in options MM.

It is going to be extremely competitive that plenty of smart people from all top schools get rejected, but I wouldn't say that attending one of those four schools will bar you from having a chance. What's the point of asking this question anyway? It's not like you're not going to apply if people here tell you that you don't have a shot.

 

Big grain of SALT

non-target with sub 3.5 (although interned in sales & trading with a bank)

interviews with 6 of the 10 best prop shops (no JSC though)

personally dont find getting an interview that hard, i find their interview processes so ridiculously more difficult than banks ( for example, with one had like 3 phone interviews and 2 take home exams that were seriously difficult (tough options theory and greeks questions until finally getting to the final round in-person interview)

oh and i dont go to any of the schools listed above me

granted i am generally the exception at interviews

IVY for Life
 
futuretrader1999:
Big grain of SALT

non-target with sub 3.5 (although interned in sales & trading with a bank)

interviews with 6 of the 10 best prop shops (no JSC though)

personally dont find getting an interview that hard, i find their interview processes so ridiculously more difficult than banks ( for example, with one had like 3 phone interviews and 2 take home exams that were seriously difficult (tough options theory and greeks questions until finally getting to the final round in-person interview)

oh and i dont go to any of the schools listed above me

granted i am generally the exception at interviews

Why even post this garbage? Looking at your history..you're a senior at Stern majoring in finance who did his summer internship with jeffries...but didnt get a return offer

 

how did you land those interviews with that gpa? Ive grinder this summer and learned to profitably trade using ta (8%) in one month. Do you think networking will give me a shot?

 
Best Response

Your sig says Ivy for life and your school says NYU, which is distinctly listed in the target range.

Basically, if you are a really good test taker in terms of fast math calculations and inductive reasoning skills, you should be able to land an interview at IMC, Tibra, or Optiver. Those type of people are usually in the STEM majors anyway. Which is why I would say, you being a member of a non-target, non-STEM degree, probably won't get through the first interview process, not saying it is impossible, but realistically.

I had a 3.3 undergrad GPA and got interviews(and superdays) at everyone that was doing OCR at my non-target school. Cold applications, I only got Tibra, Optiver, and Two-Sigma(hedge fund) to give me a chance. I ended up with an offer from a lower tier shop(salaried, but not 80K+ like the others), but it should give me a good chance to prove myself because I was not a traditional student.

 
protectedclass:
Your sig says Ivy for life and your school says NYU, which is distinctly listed in the target range.

Basically, if you are a really good test taker in terms of fast math calculations and inductive reasoning skills, you should be able to land an interview at IMC, Tibra, or Optiver. Those type of people are usually in the STEM majors anyway. Which is why I would say, you being a member of a non-target, non-STEM degree, probably won't get through the first interview process, not saying it is impossible, but realistically.

I had a 3.3 undergrad GPA and got interviews(and superdays) at everyone that was doing OCR at my non-target school. Cold applications, I only got Tibra, Optiver, and Two-Sigma(hedge fund) to give me a chance. I ended up with an offer from a lower tier shop(salaried, but not 80K+ like the others), but it should give me a good chance to prove myself because I was not a traditional student.

Do you work for BT?

 

I love the kids that say it isn't hard to get interviews with these firms....

I went to a top target for trading that has dozens of people in each of the top trading firms (founders of multiple trading firms and hedge funds that are well known). I couldn't count how many people I knew either personally or in various classes or through friends got only a couple interviews despite having superb GPAs in quantitative majors (ie >3.6 in math/stat/physics/comp sci, intern experience at Google or other tech start-up or bank, etc.) and having good internship experience. It simply isn't that easy and, even if you get a first round, if they somehow mistakenly gave you a shot, you will without a doubt fuck it up if you are not qualified because most firms seem to be able to sift through the bullshit fairly quickly.

 
Jerome Marrow:
I love the kids that say it isn't hard to get interviews with these firms....

I went to a top target for trading that has dozens of people in each of the top trading firms (founders of multiple trading firms and hedge funds that are well known). I couldn't count how many people I knew either personally or in various classes or through friends got only a couple interviews despite having superb GPAs in quantitative majors (ie >3.6 in math/stat/physics/comp sci, intern experience at Google or other tech start-up or bank, etc.) and having good internship experience. It simply isn't that easy and, even if you get a first round, if they somehow mistakenly gave you a shot, you will without a doubt fuck it up if you are not qualified because most firms seem to be able to sift through the bullshit fairly quickly.

Wow. I didn't know just getting interviews at top prop shops are that difficult.

In your opinion, which prop firms have the toughest interviews?

 
Jerome Marrow:
I love the kids that say it isn't hard to get interviews with these firms....

I went to a top target for trading that has dozens of people in each of the top trading firms (founders of multiple trading firms and hedge funds that are well known). I couldn't count how many people I knew either personally or in various classes or through friends got only a couple interviews despite having superb GPAs in quantitative majors (ie >3.6 in math/stat/physics/comp sci, intern experience at Google or other tech start-up or bank, etc.) and having good internship experience. It simply isn't that easy and, even if you get a first round, if they somehow mistakenly gave you a shot, you will without a doubt fuck it up if you are not qualified because most firms seem to be able to sift through the bullshit fairly quickly.

Having worked just two years in this business, I guess I still count as a kid. No need to be snide however.

Read what the poster is asking again. He's not asking whether it's easy to get interviews with prop trading companies, and that's not what I answered. He wanted to know if a business major from a solid school will be considered at all. Working for a desk at BB that competes directly with many of these prop shops, and having gone through the recruiting process myself, I feel I'm qualified enough to answer that.

 

JSC is known to be absurd.... Very very picky and they are able to be for a variety of reasons.

Optiver's test can be difficult if you aren't quick with mental math. The people I have met the work there or used to work there are certainly smart, but not apparently any different from the numerous other trading firms. They manage their traders and the risk of their groups much differently than many other prop firms involved in the same space (ie DRW/CTC/Ronin/Wolverine), so that can lead to different people/personalities working there.

Jump's interview is not easy. Not sure what else to say here, but if you somehow get an interview and you aren't terrific with math and basic programming, you have little chance of making it past this stage. It doesn't matter really what your GPA is and it won't be helping you in the interview.

Can't comment on many others, but they all have a lot of similarities. Remember, even these lesser known firms are owned and operated by people who went to top schools and have tens of millions (if not hundreds of millions) of dollars in their bank account from actually performing with their own capital and having their bank accounts on the line in both their own trading activities and those activities of the people they hire.

Also remember that trading, in general, is more forgiving of atypical candidates unlike banking and whatnot. So sure, you may hear of a person who had a 3.3 that got an interview or perhaps even a job, but that says little about the person's IQ or problem solving abilities, which are generally tested in interviews.

 

The OP used the term "hired" and clarified it by saying "considered". You would and probably should infer that he meant get an interview. Duke engineering is quite a bit different than undergrad B-School at UT-Austin.

I would recommend, again, for the OP to apply to shops that have a little bit more of an "open" recruiting policy, as-in, anyone that can pass the numerical test(by no means easy) can at least get a phone interview.

 

That's exactly what I mean, that you can be "considered" and "hired" without an engineering degree from a top school. No one said that it was easy, just possible. In fact, we hired an analyst last year that had a business degree (albeit engineering double major) from a state school on par with UT Austin.

This is a pointless argument anyway. People will apply no matter what others tell them, even ones that have much less of a shot than OP.

 

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