PhD subject proposed by a bank/ hedge fund

[luckyslevin]

Hello community!


I will be very grateful if someone could share his points of view/experience about the possibility of doing a PhD in quantitative finance, working on a subject proposed by a bank or a hedge fund firm. In other words you work on a subject demanded by a bank.


Other question: Did someone tried to do his full-time PhD at the same time as working i.e. for example working 4 days in the firm as a quant and other 3 days doing PhD research.


Thank you a lot!

 

[tfors]

Not me personally but i know some guys doing it (4 days at the bank, 1 day at university, 2 days free, this is continental europe). Don't know how they got there, but it's not unusual nowadays at all it seems combining the two.

 

[Drew L]

That would be so ideal...
I'm about done with my MSc, but would do a PhD if I could work in school

 

[weinjsuny]

I heard some students at Imperial/Oxford have paid project proposed by bank/hedge fund.

 

[TehRaio]

in france they have what they call CIFRE contracts under which a company and the state can co-fund a PhD thesis. Basically you work for the company, and your thesis supervisor is affiliated with the university. I think CIFRE students earn more than the typical 1700€/mth you get as a PhD in france, I've seen salaries in the 30k€/yr. By the time you're done with your thesis you have 3 years of experience and you can apply for positions as senior quant etc...