Hey guys, so I'm stuck between learning R and Python, and I'm in a fundamental equity research role. Interested in learning 1 of the 2 (could learn both, but honestly I have way too much to learn outside of coding and don't have the time do learn 2 languages on top of that).
For those of you who work in fundamental equity HFs, which of the two is more effective in your day to day, as well as in helping project revenue drivers? What kind of things do you use it for? Which of the two do HF PMs look for as well?
Not in HF space so cant comment on that explicitly, but do know a thing or two about CS.
I would do python over R. It can do everything R can and more, but also at times can be a bit more clunky to use.
Learn both. The incremental time necessary to pick up the second language is trivial. The only reason either would be helpful in project revenue drivers is if you are working with large/alternative data sets. Otherwise, my personal experience is that a programming language does not move the needle when it comes to accurately forecasting cash flows.
What sort of things do you use each of those languages for in your day-to-day if you don't mind me asking?
Pairs trading: Johansen test for cointegration
Most fundamental funds are unwilling to do anything fancy with data science. Good luck showing your code to your PM and having him invest. Coding is only useful insofar as it extracts a signal that an MBA type can understand.
What about just using it to support your modeling assumptions or for data visualization in charts/graphs using R? Is this used at all?
Python is very practical and comes in handy for just about anything you do and like the others said, it's not hard to learn both at once.
Python is great to start with because there are more resources out there for picking it up quickly and it's pretty intuitive once you get going IMO.
Python is easier to learn and more broadly useful. R is much better for exploratory data analysis and modeling, in my opinion. Take that as you will.
Any recommendations on best practices to learn R/Python?
Start with code academy. PM me if you want more stuff because it depends on what your intended use is. Python for automation is v different than python for prototyping quant strats.
+1 Code Academy.
I've never found any of my coding experience to be useful in my fundamental equity career. There are better ways to invest your time (unless you just like programming, in which case go for it).
code fights and hacker rank aren't bad for learning Python
Not a fundamental equity guy, but I know R and if I was starting over I would do Python first, it has much broader applicability and is more recognizable. You would be able to switch to R if you found something you wanted to do but couldn't.
Go with python. As others have mentioned, it's far more useful than R. Plus, more APIs...
Python over R in almost all circumstances.
in all seriousness how are you guys actually using python as a fundamental analyst? or are you all in college? i've never heard of this and am genuinely curious. i've heard of pods at citadel GE having quants on their teams essentially get credit card data into tableau for them using python.
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