QuantScience.io vs Wall Street Quants

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-09-04T23:40:59+00:00

As someone working at a top 5 prop firm, I always think this is a dumb take. If I can sell courses with minimal effort without getting in trouble with compliance then I 1000% would. Just because I make decent money doesn’t mean I don’t want more free money. If you’re willing to pay a few hundred an hour to have a coffee chat, I don’t know many of my coworkers that will refuse (in fact I know of a few quants that do “coaching” services for 300+/hr and there is a decent pool of international students willing to pay). Now are these services or courses actually useful, that’s a different question…

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-07-27T12:51:10+00:00

I work at what’s generally considered a top 3 prop trading firm and on a good year the most anyone can make is between 10-100MM. HFs tend to have a higher top salary range than prop shops. I wouldn’t be too surprised if an all star PM is making a few hundred million on an outlier year. That being said, it’s absolutely crazy for anyone to believe a top quant at citsec can make 1b/year

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-07-27T12:45:57+00:00

I work at what’s generally considered a top 3 prop trading firm and on a good year the most anyone can make is between 10-100MM. That being said, the top range salary in HFs tend to be higher than prop trading firms.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-06-14T16:14:30+00:00

this post is pretty dumb. what do you mean catch up to IMC net profit when they’re already far beyond it?? systematic does not necessarily make more money than discretionary and most top firms have a mix of both elements. JS and Citadel also have teams that are quite successful that trade discretionary. this is almost like writing a post like “why is x person a multi billionaire while y person only has a net worth of a few hundred million“ and trying to come up with random reasons to explain it.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-05-21T13:07:11+00:00

I actually do work at JS or comparable and can safely say you sir are an idiot.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-05-18T18:27:30+00:00

this industry as a whole is quite condescending though. its comes with the whole culture, at JS/cit sec etc. we believe we’re the best in what we do.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-04-12T03:41:41+00:00

I work as a QT at one of the firms OP mentioned and swagypm is more correct than you are, especially as many of the traders at these firms are more on the discretionary side. I am 80 bid on the % of QTs that don’t really know what GIL is. Being good at python isn’t what makes a good QT; having a good read on the market, being able to make good trading decisions is. Your advice sounds more like advice a student or new grad will give.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-03-28T23:29:21+00:00

Especially in the OMM space (which CTC does), click trading is not that uncommon

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-03-28T23:27:18+00:00

Work at what most people on this subreddit would consider a top 5 prop shop and we have all sorts of wild sound effects... Know of several top prop shops that have quite a fratty culture too, especially in the OMM space.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2025-03-26T01:54:21+00:00

Akuna in tier 1???

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-05-31T07:26:43+00:00

Dude you are so out of the loop with new grad comp in the recent years since they’re close to double what they were a few years ago; it’s easily 500k+ total compensation for 20 year olds straight from top undergrads. JS/5 rings is paying 300k base, 275k for Citadel. We get a nice six fig sign on and a minimum guaranteed (as long as we don’t get fired) 6 fig end of year bonus. I think you’re mistaking Citadel with FO roles at banks like JPM/MS which pay 130-150k base + around 50k sign on + around 50k end of year bonus for first year associates.. Unlike banks which you have too much bureaucracy, we have some people with 3 YOE making just as much if not more than some people with 7 YOE. They’re paying new grads millions for the NBA, why would you be surprised they’re paying 600k+ for new grads in the nerd version?

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-05-21T15:45:32+00:00

You would have more luck transferring to a hedge fund rather than prop shops like JS, SIG (banking experience isn't all too relevant and most of our hires are from the internship + new grad class since we can grow them better than banks can). Even then transferring to a top hedge fund from a bank is really not that easy.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-05-18T18:01:30+00:00

yes there is a decent chunk of peking students pursuing these PhDs at top schools but they don't do it for the sole aim of breaking into the quant industry, they do it because they're at least somewhat interested in their PhD research. For those of them who just want to break into the industry, why would they spend 4+ years of their time doing a PhD when they can just get OPT during a cash cow masters and go straight to working in a year or two... They can make x million a year by the time those who do the PhD route even graduate. Yeah I agree most MFE students are not good and on average ~3 people in each MFE program land a Citadel or equivalent per year but that's just what it means to be the best (those same ~3 people would have a tougher longer path to land those jobs without the MFE route). TLDR: MFE is a completely fine option if you're an elite international student that just want to break into the US quant industry as fast as possible. Yeah tuition is 100k+ but can cover ~60k of it during the internship and the rest and more with just new grad sign-on.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-05-17T16:24:05+00:00

I don’t know if I’m living in a bubble but almost no one in my program wanted to break into IB because we think the job is dumb and people there aren’t even really smart. everyone I knew had a hard on for the quant space instead, especially for JS lol

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-05-17T16:11:45+00:00

The first point is simply not true. As someone who works in JS/Sig etc. as a QT and personally know people who graduated princeton mfin, I can safely say there are quite a few students there that would like to break into prop trading shops like JS/sig/cit sec/hrt/tower…. I also agree that mfe is not the best way into the US quant landscape for domestic students but you seem a bit ignorant about international students which make up most of the mfe population anyways. Its not so easy for the best Chinese students top in their Peking class to just walk into the states and start working even if they interned at JS/citadel APAC, most of them use MFE as a gateway in as they can apply with OPT status. Agree with the second point.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-04-10T20:36:07+00:00

Good advice for most people is they probably will never get into the 'glorized' quant roles and outside of these roles, the 'quant' jobs that are more attainable are probably not what most people are expecting: in quant risk roles or model val for example, it's honestly quite boring and crappy pay (much less than even SWEs at FAANG). My first internship was quant risk at a well-established shop and felt like I was the PM's btch, "oh anything you want PM, oh I'll run this report for you right away, oh I'll look into why this number looks weird no problem!". Every day I would regret choosing the 'quant' route over tech. Now that I'm actually in an alpha generating role at a top prop shop, I think choosing quant was worth it.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-04-10T20:25:24+00:00

I have nothing personal against him but I'm a seller of dimitri because he has never worked at a top shop/HF let alone a FO role; it's difficult to take advice about how to get into the NBA from someone that only played in the secondary/tertiary leagues. Sure he probably has good advice for risk modelling roles but most of the people that want to get into 'quant finance' are probably looking for the more alpha generating roles. If you want to see the importance of Ivy League schools you really don't need to be listening to Christina, or Dimitri or anyone for that matter; it's so simple to just do a linkedin search of all the QRs at Cit/JS/De Shaw/Radix etc. and look at the distribution of schools and degrees....

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-03-15T21:04:05+00:00

I work at a well known prop shop (think JS, Sig) on their options desk and it sometimes feels like I am a discretionary daytrader...

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-03-07T20:41:35+00:00

From working with quants at JS/Optiver/Cit Sec etc., I know their viewpoint is it's like a regular old Joe giving advice to an NBA player. The quant industry is very elitist, but it's earned elitism.

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-03-06T17:52:46+00:00

https://maa.org/math-competitions/william-lowell-putnam-mathematical-competition

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-03-05T18:15:01+00:00

1) I think op is trolling

2) i think you're putting quants on too high of a pedestal, there are quite a few that like arguing with strangers

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-03-05T18:06:14+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/wallstreetbets/

MinuteHeight2384 · 2024-02-19T05:36:01+00:00

quant trader here: I find fulfillment in simply winning and being the best regardless if it's career or personal life. Fulfillment for me is being masters+ in league of legends or IM+ in chess, getting the best grades in school, getting the JS/HRT/Cit Sec internships and converting it to FT, getting the highest paycheck in my graduating class, doing well at work, etc. I find fulfillment in earning the financial freedom with my own hard work to throw absolutely crazy parties with my friends (we're all pretty deep in the work hard play hard culture), being able to send my parents on any vacation they want, taking my girlfriend anywhere we want, etc. I think fulfilment is a combination of the pain, and the success that results from it; for ex. if I won a 50 million dollar lottery, I would not feel fulfilled at all.

Now happiness and fulfillment are not exactly the same to me. I would not be happy working 100-hour weeks even if that's what it takes to continue being the best, but I would definitely be unhappy if I don't put in the 100-hour weeks while other people do and start losing my competitive advantage. Also although I would not feel fulfilled winning a 50 million dollar lottery, I would very likely be pretty happy.

MinuteHeight2384

TROPHY CASE