Help me figure out what to do with a PhD

[Mr. Now]

Requirements:

regular hours
no selling
playing strategy games
good money


I hope these links are useful to you. Here you go.


Decision making

Book: Decision Traps

Strategy trading (quant trading)

These PDFs may get you interested in strategy trading. For the record, I am not recommending any trading products mentioned in the PDFs and links listed below. The content is some of the best you can find on the subject of strategy trading if you are new to the game.

http://www.trading-naked.com/library/Chap1.pdf
http://www.trading-naked.com/library/Chap2.pdf
http://www.trading-naked.com/library/Chap3.pdf
http://www.trading-naked.com/library/Chap4.pdf
http://www.trading-naked.com/library/Chap5.pdf
http://www.trading-naked.com/library/Chap6.pdf
http://www.trading-naked.com/library/Chap7.pdf
http://www.trading-naked.com/library/Chap8.pdf
http://www.trading-naked.com/library/Chap9.pdf

See also:
http://www.smartquant.com/doc.php

[crazy canuck]

[ QUOTE ]

There are a huge number of job listings for quants. I'm not sure how big the applicant pool is, but given the $200k+ salaries, I think there's a desperate shortage of quants.


[/ QUOTE ]


I guess I should elaborate on this, since at least two of you brought this up.

First of all, there is a shortage of quants at all levels except at the entry level. This means, that a big chunk of people who gradute from relatively decent masters programs (like University of Toronto) do not end up working as a quant. They might start working as actuaries, do some regression for a mutual fund (that's not quant) or work at a back office, but very few of these people make 200k even as seniors. Secondly, the market is red hot now and hence there are significant bonuses and inflated starting salaries.

Working hours depend on the firm...I know entry level people in Canada who work 40 hrs and got offered 80k base and 20% bonus....not even at top firms. But as I said, there are many people who get offered 60k or nothing.

Also, many employers would be impressed if you tell them you implemented your own aribtrage alert system (I'm assuming its automated), since there is some arbitrage in financial markets (of course it's significantly harder to take advanate of this). This would put you way ahead of many other applicants.

PS: also check out the careers forum at

wilmott