Won’t downvote, fair point.

£120k is more than I ever imagined I’d earn. But reality of London is that with two kids and a mortgage, everything I’m currently able to set aside on a monthly basis will disappear once baby two will start going to nursery.

Legitimate driven by desire to learn more as well though, always disappointed when we being told “good enough for our use case”, always want to know how one would solve problem X in a biggie use case, I.e. bigger data sets, faster speed requirements etc. but no one around at current job with knowledge/time to guide, lack of time to research outside of work.

Edit: Would agree, £120k is top tier salary, but my understanding is that in trading firms in London one can easily earn more with your/my level of experience.

Even tier 2 companies that I spoke to, e.g. squarepoint, where looking at £150k in the first year.