Quant vs SWE
To preface this, I’m an incoming college first year. I’m pretty new to recruiting and job search in general, so I appreciate as many details as possible.
I’m interested in a quant or swe role at a hedge fund or prop trading firm. My understanding is that the fundamental skills needed to get these jobs are not too different (programming, mathematical skills and brain teasers, statistics/probability). Am I right here?
If this is true, will a firm let me apply to both a swe and quant trading role simultaneously or will I have to pick one?
Thanks for the help.
While there is some overlap and they tend to recruit in similar pipes (depending on firm) I would say the roles are pretty different.
First, you have to understand what you mean by “quant”, I’m guessing you mean quant researcher, as in someone who is using statistics/math/etc to find new alpha ideas in the markets. Those roles tend to be more stats/math/Econ (depending how “quantamental”/fundamental the place is). While computer science and understanding how to code are important (necessary), it is just a tool you use to represent and research your ideas. So what you get paid for is the alpha.
An SWE also can mean a broad set of things at a fund, from purely infrastructure build, to be closer to a quant (I.e. helping build the tooling while understanding the business). For these people the coding is what they get paid for (architecture, ability to code and build things) and not for their math/stats/Econ knowledge.
But as I said, many college students don’t know what they want to do, so firms will recruit similar profiles (CS, math, hard sciences). And while there is some internal mobility it is best to start down the path you are interested as some firms won’t be as open to letting people move around.
Thanks for the response. By “quant” I meant quant trader and by “swe” I meant quant developer. Does what you said still apply?
Also, since you mentioned it, what’s the difference between a quant researcher and a quant trader?
That’s the thing with roles/titles they mean different things at different places. In general (but again will vary) quant researcher is the title I have seen used more often for people developing alpha ideas. I believe, but I see it used less that quant trader is similar. Quant developer is more along the lines of what I said (but remove the comments about infrastructure and focus more on building the tooling).
Ok. In your general definition, is quant researcher typically the role given out of undergrad or is that quant trader? I’m asking because I heard that mostly graduate PhD students get the quant researcher roles.
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