Quant trading: electronic options market making vs. delta one vs. high frequency FX, which one is better?

Hi all,

Suppose you are facing a choice of career and you have to choose among the following three (all are Quant trading):

  1. Electronic options market making
  2. Equities Delta One
  3. High frequency FX

All of these three jobs have high frequency trading flavor and all are considered as quant trading. And you role is quant/developer for all these three positions, which one is better?

Thanks a lot!

8 Comments
 

The first two are with top tier IBs; the third is with a second tier IB, still within top 10.

All these desks are new. They've just hired senior guys from other established places. So there were no track records so far.

I was initially worried about being a quant developer and doing programming all day like a monkey. But it turns out nowadays and looking into future, all tradings will be electronic so programmer/quant developer is indeed synonymous to trader title I guess for quant trading...

 
losemindThe first two are with top tier IBs; the third is with a second tier IB, still within top 10.

All these desks are new. They've just hired senior guys from other established places. So there were no track records so far.

I was initially worried about being a quant developer and doing programming all day like a monkey. But it turns out nowadays and looking into future, all tradings will be electronic so programmer/quant developer is indeed synonymous to trader title I guess for quant trading...

I still wouldn't classify the programming as being synonymous to a trader. It's still two very different functions.

 

delta one desks usually have two components, a client focused flow side that trades the different equity swaps products (index, cutomized baskets, single names, all long and short). and then they also have a purely prop side that runs dividend arb, index arb, and some high frequency trading strats. delta one desks are given a ton of balance sheet due to the financing nature of the product, so its a good seat to trade principally.

 

How do the three career path compare in the long run, in terms of monetary return? My ultimate goal is to launch my own hedgefund...

Thanks!

 

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