You need to be able to make money from the markets for a few years before anyone is going to listen to what you say, never mind employ you
A job at a large bank is a preferable starting point because you will have access to many more people from which to learn from, and you get to develop a network of contacts who will come in very handy down the road. Trading is mostly electronic at the banks now anyway so don't think you will be sitting next to sweaty guys yelling "Mine!!...yours!!" into phones. However, if a stable, decent sized (>25 people) hedge fund gives you a good offer take it. Don't worry about doing HFT or algorithmic trading right now. Just learn how the business works and develop your programming skills. HFT is very competitive with lots of turnover (from what I have observed). My friends who went into it over the last 10 years are mostly doing other things now (and these are hardcore programmers who went to places like MIT and Stanford). There will be many, many other ways to make money in this business in the coming years but you have to be attuned to new growth areas and not look to squeeze into a crowd. One more thing...trading is a rapidly shrinking part of the financial ecosystem. Remember...you are solely responsible for your own career. Make sure you have enough tools in your personal career toolkit.
@EquityGuy4321 i don't really know what my prospects at banks are. The banks won't tell anyone if they have an interview for a few weeks because they're still aggregating resumes. If I got a good front office S&T job for a BB, I'd strongly consider it. My chances at those jobs aren't very high though. Speak from my previous experience interning at a bank, my only way in is going to be nepotism. I thought I had finally moved past accepting nepotism when I got my own internship on merit last year, but maybe if things get a bit desperate this year I'll either go back to my old investment bank/people that left that bank and ask about sales and trading. We'll see if I get any interviews before we start calling people. I think my best bet at sticking to your advice at the moment would be hedge funds. The three that I'm interviewing with are CT & NYC based, multibillion AUM, way more than 25 people. The type that do on campus recruiting--you'll have heard of them if you work in the industry. Now like I said earlier, only one even does HFT, and they want me for dev only roles. Sorry, I can't change my passions. If Bridgewater goes well, I'll definitely take it because it seems like a great place to work and they've spent considerable effort on recruiting me like having me eat out with traders and TAs. The HFT one is known throughout the industry for poor advancement. The remaining hedge fund wouldn't be bad. The prevailing issue with all three is that they are very competitive. All good jobs are competitive, but trust me, these hedge funds really do get the best and brightest. The aforementioned fund has given me a lot of facetime with their people and they're all extremely smart with educations similar to mine (they probably got better grades). In closing, I'll definitely consider your advice, albeit not really related to my original question. At risk of sounding hard headed, I still think a prop shop is my most likely destination because 1) they are gonna have the first shots at me because they have early final round interviews. The hedge funds did all say they'd move interviews up for exploding offers though. 2) they seem to be the least competitive, except Jane Street which has seemed ungodly competitive so far. The first guy I talked to there was an ACM finalist and chess grad-something and he's definitely younger than me. 3) their culture probably fits me best. 4) they'be made the biggest accommodations for me thus far. 5) they don't have on campus interviews which are usually very competitive at my school. To be honest, I'm sitting here listing out my preferences like I already have choices. That seems a bit ridiculous to me. In reality, I'd be thrilled to get any of these jobs. I'm just gonna go do my interviews and put my best foot forward, and if I get anything, "great", I'll give the other companies a chance to interview me if they want, then I'll make a decision, if I don't get anything, I'll just go back to software and try again next year for full time work.
You keep ignoring me, can you make money trading or not?!! If you can't then what on earth are you on about?!! nobody is going to be interested in your aspirations to work somewhere as a trader or anything along those lines
@wwatson1 i feel if you would have read my posts on this thread, you would have seen that I in fact already have a number of entities who are considering hiring me to assist them in the process of making money by trading. They will train me for various lengths of time to prepare me for my trading responsibilities, I would also write software--these are services rendered. It's an entry level job. Moreover, what would you prefer I do? Trade retail for some period of time? A cursory look at the replies and my question will indicate that that's not what professionals would recommend. On some level, we all have a responsibility to do our part to decrease the negativity and disinformation on this site, so I just encourage you to look at colleges' career education websites for prop trading and hedge fund internships as they do exist.
That is really interesting about "legit" prop vs arcade. When looking for a job I did hear of places that paid a salary vs places that paid a %, but I did not see this distinction as meaningful. I figured if you were on salary and did poorly you'd get fired. And if you did well you'd be making about what you'd make if you made a percent. And if you did REALLY well on salary you'd get a raise but not truly commensurate with the increased amount you were making. Therefore % would be better. I am not saying this is the case, just what I thought of it at the time.
Investment banks & hedge funds don't care about someones retail trading pseudo gambling career. They care about highly educated, bright, highly trainable guys. Do you think all the harvard grads that get jobs at HF's and IB's had a clue about retail trading before hand ? and if they did it wouldn't have mattered.
@Fundlord thanks for your reply. Although the compensation is probably better starting out at a bank than a prop shop, I don't know what my leads in banking are right now as most places are still collecting resumes or just stopped. I am somewhat interested in banking. I'm more interested in market making or software though. Just like art majors, I too want to go pursue my interests, so I think a prop shop or going back to a software role may be my best bet. @Ferdinand It's really not the same job at all. I don't think it can be compared 1-to-1. The prop shops I'm talking about are market makers/relative value arb traders. That being said, suppose the strategies taught at both types of firms were equally valid just for discussion. All things equal, I would prefer to take a job: a) with a salary. At a HFT company, you still eat what you kill, but at least if I get fired I still made a salary for that duration of time vs. burning my own capital. b) where I'm forced to learn. I don't think Technical Analysis is as interesting as math and software. Even if it made money it would just feel like pulling a bunch of levers and punching a time clock to me. c) where I continue to develop skills that are marketable outside of trading such as programming. d) where I can learn about a longstanding fascination: market making.