Hello all, I need some advice on how to move forward with my career. Background: Target school engineering school bachelors. Great track record with R&D the past 4 years in same company. My process has being holding certain industry records since 2010. This is a 60~70hr /wk job with 24/7 on call. Mid 5-digits for salary. While working, developed great interest within finance industry. On my spare time, I crawled through data for NPV calculations and writing programs to identify mispriced options. I knew that I wanted to make a career out of this. My current job has no future for career development, and I have not learned much new on job for some time now. I don't have an econ or finance degree, but I have done enough research on my own to be confident that "we can speak the same language". Recently, I was in process of interviewing with several top-tier HF where I was indicated to be leading candidate. However, H1B caps was filled for 2013 (I'm foreign) before we finished the interview processes and that's now a dead end. Now is also too late to apply for grad school for 2012 fall admission. My top priority is to either switch career or to get back in school. Since I am not learning anything new anymore at my current position, with no route for development, I don't want to stay working for any more than necessary. I feel that I have a good enough grasp of the hf industry that I could also potentially start my own fund if I had the seed money. If I could get advice on my situation, it'd be appreciated.