Junior Trading Role - Quantitative trading firm
Hi all,
I have an interview coming up for a Junior trader position at a quant fund (DRW, Optiver, Jump) and was wondering if someone could help me with 2 things:
1) This is not a Quant trader role, but a traditional trading role on a desk that specializes in few executions per day and long holding periods. Can someone comment on whether or not a role like this would be a good place to start a career in trading? I come from a tech background and would like to move to the algorithmic side, but have not been able to break in. Perhaps this could be my in?
2) Besides being interested in macro events, the recruiter hasn't given me much. I don't come from a finance background (i study CS in school) and I was wondering if someone could point me towards resources that I could use to help fill the gaps in my knowledge.
Hey, so based on the info you've given I think I know what role and company you're talking about. So if we're thinking about the same role here, it's hard to say whether this would be a good place to start a 'career' in trading. The skills developed in this trading desk are very niche. People who leave seem to go on to non-trading jobs, but the people who do stay and become senior are compensated very well with an incredible work life balance.
However, it takes time (5+ years to never) to become senior on this desk where your WLB becomes incredibly good. Not sure if you can move to the algo side from this desk as the job doesn't entail coding or doing anything remotely technical. Maybe having the name on the resume would be helpful though, as well as the experience of running risk.
Regarding preparing for the interview, having a finance degree probably won't help. Technical finance knowledge won't give you much of a leg up in the interview. Logical reasoning, quick thinking and excellent reading comprehension will be far more important. The only 'finance' knowledge you need to know regards current important macro events. Best way to prep for this is to read as many news articles about macro news every day in FT, WSJ, Bloomberg and digest it all.
Hope this helps
Do u mind if i DM you to ask you more?
Would prefer answering in the thread
I’m pretty sure I’m interviewing for this role this week. It’s a junior trader role at one of the names mentioned above and not the main office. Would appreciate if you got any tips for the logical reasoning and reading comprehension part of the interview.
I would say free verbal reasoning tests like this https://www.assessmentday.co.uk/aptitudetests_verbal.htm are probably a good bet if you want some extra practice for the reading comprehension test. Otherwise, the reading comprehension part is fairly straightforward. Regarding the logical reasoning part, I honestly have no idea how someone would prepare because its such a 'unique' test. Maybe the verbal reasoning tests would work as well, but focus on getting them fast in addition to being right.
Hi, can I dm to ask you more about this company? I know which company you're talking about and was wondering if you knew about their other desks. Thanks!
Hi, unfortunately I know next to nothing about their other desks
Execution role for quant funds seem to draw a lot of sell side traders out of the sell side. Wondering what comp looks like as well
Just curious whether what traditional trading role are you referring to: optiver and drw both have Trader/Trading Analyst & quant trader/quant trading analyst for juniors(their roles don't seem much different) while having execution trader which are what the above comment seems to refer to.
Not sure about Jump though
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