I see some props require these skills...is this for building systems? And what are the chances of a trader landing a position without these skills for a firm that is seeking? Thanks
Yeah they are used to import data over the internet to aid in judging trades . . . There are trading jobs out there that don't require programming. It helps though if everybody can back up there own work . . that way the firm isn't paying out tonnes of money in overhead.
without those skills you will be executing orders ... a glorified clerk. You need at least minimal programming abilities or be good with a paper and pencil otherwise you'll be dependent on someone else all the time..
any idea of a "crash course" on basic programming skills and how long at the minimum to acquire the skills needed?
how good is it to have C++ in your resume? and if you were to put it in your resume how much do they expect you to know?
If you do a google search you'll come across tonnes of stuff focused on beginning programming. You could buy a book too but you can do tonnes of stuff on the web. It takes a lot of work to learn enough to actually accomplish something towards trading. The timetable depends on how old you are and how easily you're discouraged. Hopefully you're young and and dedicate enough time to really learn something. You're going to come to points where you stuck with an error message and you can't get past it on your own. It's imperative to have someone/somewhere you can go to get you past the big hurdles. Hopefully you can come here and post specific questions and get help.
to be good will take you 10+ years. to do something useful will take a few months. trading is broadly defined so find out what they expect you to do.
I agree that getting into trading without good programming skills SEVERELY limits your options and income potential. As far as how much you need, it depends. Some trading positions require only light programming, VBA for simple analysis on data in Excel/SQL. You could achieve this level of proficiency with a few months of hard self-study. (I got lucky, and I happened to get a good job without much in the way of programming skills. I recently started a professional Master's program in computer science, though, to remedy the situation. So far, it has been an intense introduction, and I expect to have a fairly useful programming skillset within a year. I highly recommend such a program to aspiring traders.)