Career path advise to a quantitative trader

Hello everybody! I need some advice for my next career choice to become a quantitative tarder in a hedge fund.

Some backgrouds about me: I am 26 years old, live in Paris. I have a degree from a top engineering school in machine learning, and now I am a c# backend developer in a startup.

Most of hedge funds are located in Londo and Amsterdam, and for personal reasons I can't change the country for the next 1 year.

I have a new offer as a developer in a big bank where I will be working in the front with quants, basically I will be using their models to optimize the calculus. The position doesn't require any financial knowledge.

Now I have 2 choices:

• Stay in my current job, where I have lots of free time, and use my time to prepare for interviews. I think in 1 year I can cover evrything, and do a personal project in quantitative strategy that I can be helpul. And try to make the jump in 1 year, some hedge fund requires to have less that 3 year experience.

• Accept the bank offer, but I will stay 3 years. And the job is demanding. So I won't have enough time to prepare. But the experience in this job can be really good in my CV.

Is there other things that I should do to maximise my chances of getting an interview and getting the job?

Thanks a lot for your help !