What desks don't need programming?

You probably need to be able to do some coding. You can take an online course at least and then you'll have something. When I was getting started, it was different. It was tough to sell my programming skills, but then I did so much stuff with it. But now I think it's guys like me doing the hiring. Now I don't end up doing too much coding because I don't have time for it. I still like doing it when I can. I actually was just talking to a recruiter about hiring someone who didn't have programming, and she told me she had no idea because no one asks for that anymore. The reason I asked her is because a lot of kids used to just learn programming on the job. But not anymore I think.

From what I have seen as an intern lol, most traders do their analysis in Excel. Unless you are trading something like interest rate derivatives or swaps, there's almost no programming in Python or whatever. It's obviously a really great skill to have as you can use Python to do analysis which is much more robust than Excel, and Python is more portable. Most desks have quant strats that develop in-house software for whatever product the desk trades so this sort of alleviates the need for the traders to know how to code. Sounds obvious but the focus of the traders is more to understand the assumptions in the software they are using and be good at using the software.