Hi, I'm 24 and searching a way into the financial industry in either NY or London. My formal qualification is a B.Sc. in Business & Computer Science. After working one year as an IT consultant I would be glad to make the switch. I love stuying the market & the action of trading/investing. My experience includes: - managing an account (equity) with an annualised return of >80% (3/4 year) - managing a mutual fund account - Business Process Management - IT (Programming, Databases) - Projectmanagement Q1) What positions should I apply for? Q2) How are my chances? Q3) Which companies could be interesting for me?
Do you have access to a Bloomberg ? Theres a sh1tload of NY and London jobs on there. Like 25 pages. Take an afternoon to comb through them and find the ones geared to entry level. A lot of them are good ways to start a career. Work your IT background. Tell recruiters you dont mind coming in on the technical side, but you refused to be pigeonholed into tech...look for ways to branch out from tech once your at a trading firm. Good Luck !
Hi, thx for the reply. My problem is my bachelor is only 3rd class honours. With that beeing said, do I have any chances at all?
Chameloentrader - you definitely have a chance. If you have/can pick up third party trading vendor skills such as Infinity, Murex, Summit, Sophis etc you will find yourself in high demand even if for short term contracts (paying upyto $1k per day). This works a number of ways: if you are a spendthrift, you will be able to save a lot of money to trade on your own account, you will be able to meet a few traders in the process. Some firms are so keen to take on as permies, contractors with the afore-mentioned scarce skills, and are often willing to give you a shot at trading after an initial period of 18months - 2years. I sincerely wish you all the best.
chameleontrader : I'm assuming you're talking about getting a trading role rather than an IT role?? Tbh you've realistically got a snowball's chance for trading as things currently stand. About your only game plan is . . 1) Are you doing IT in the City? If not, start. 2) Get into the Desk Dev side of things . . . vba/excel a bit of C++ . . . where you are working on or very, very near the desk 3) Learn the business ie both the products and the mentality. 3) Take it from there. Seen four or five guys over the last 10 years make this transition.
What is paid like today knowing above, with some trading experiance (if not profitable and with consistancy) and strategy writting, but not very good coder in system languages yet?
update: I'm going for a prop trader job. Had an interview for a broker position, but I would hate it. What kind of firms can I go for? I'm looking for some companies from 2nd or 3rd row and build from there.