Registered Nurse Thinking About Switching Careers and Entering a MS in Financial Engineering program

[Joy Pathak]

Is this actually true though, the part about 200k. Seems contradictory to what I assume to know.

Truer words have never been spoken. I think 200k once you get to VP with bonus at a good bank is prolly the number for most financial engineers.

Unless you are a trader at a big sell side bank and making good PnL prop trading or a hedge fund PM you are sitting in the 150-250 range as a VP/Director in middle office/backoffice.

If you make it... then u will get close to 10% of your prop trading pnl.... so you can make 500k-1mm+ as a director or MD at a sellside or hedge fund or whatever your alpha mandate is.

I think maybe 1 in 100 .. maybe 1 in 200 financial engineers become full sellside traders? and then out of like say 10 traders maybe 1-2 actually make money? out of say 10 sellside money making traders maybe 1 eventually becomes a PM at an asset manager or hedge fund?

Tough odds.

 

[Michsund]

Truer words have never been spoken. I think 200k once you get to VP with bonus at a good bank is prolly the number for most financial engineers.

Unless you are a trader at a big sell side bank and making good PnL prop trading or a hedge fund PM you are sitting in the 150-250 range as a VP/Director in middle office/backoffice.

If you make it... then u will get close to 10% of your prop trading pnl.... so you can make 500k-1mm+ as a director or MD at a sellside or hedge fund or whatever your alpha mandate is.

I think maybe 1 in 100 .. maybe 1 in 200 financial engineers become full sellside traders? and then out of like say 10 traders maybe 1-2 actually make money? out of say 10 sellside money making traders maybe 1 eventually becomes a PM at an asset manager or hedge fund?

Tough odds.

So your saying 200k with bonus for a vp quant in middle office position.

 

[Joy Pathak]

So your saying 200k with bonus for a vp quant in middle office position.

yeah prolly fair statement. in todays climate ... 150-250 range for a VP middle office quant.. makes sense. obviously there are exceptions but that sounds about right to me.

 

[Michsund]

yeah prolly fair statement. in todays climate ... 150-250 range for a VP middle office quant.. makes sense. obviously there are exceptions but that sounds about right to me.

What would these ranges look like for a front office position. I'm wondering since many of these mfe have base starting around 100k so yeah.

 

[JamalTheTrader]

The figures don't seem that surprising. I think this is a field for competitive spirits. You want to be striving to be on top. If there's a field you want to be very passionate about, this is one of them.

 

[Joy Pathak]

What would these ranges look like for a front office position. I'm wondering since many of these mfe have base starting around 100k so yeah.

The base is same no matter what part of the bank you are...

unless you are a trader or on a profitable desk the only variation is the bonus. It all depends.. if you are front office.. like say an associate or a VP but dont have your own book than your bonus is dictated by how well the desk has done... if you are running your own book.. its dependant on your balance sheet and how good you are at prop trading and making money. so not sure what to tell you... you can make 100K bonus.. or yo uca make 10mm bonus.... depends on desk by desk and how high you are..

if you are a VP running your own book on a very profitable desk.. you are usually capped to 500-600K . Director can get to 1mm.. and obviously MD is where there are usually no caps.

 

[Michsund]

The base is same no matter what part of the bank you are...

unless you are a trader or on a profitable desk the only variation is the bonus. It all depends.. if you are front office.. like say an associate or a VP but dont have your own book than your bonus is dictated by how well the desk has done... if you are running your own book.. its dependant on your balance sheet and how good you are at prop trading and making money. so not sure what to tell you... you can make 100K bonus.. or yo uca make 10mm bonus.... depends on desk by desk and how high you are..

if you are a VP running your own book on a very profitable desk.. you are usually capped to 500-600K . Director can get to 1mm.. and obviously MD is where there are usually no caps.

Yeah I was just wondering because I worked at a buy side recruiting firm and the numbers that I saw people get paid on the quant side we’re pretty insane at places. But I guess these are the top people not the avarage quant.

 

[Joy Pathak]

Yeah I was just wondering because I worked at a buy side recruiting firm and the numbers that I saw people get paid on the quant side we’re pretty insane at places. But I guess these are the top people not the avarage quant.

yeah it all depends. there are quant developers i know who get paid 500K + just coding. they dont even know what a tick is.

 

[jah.david.kim]

Joy, Michsund, Jamal. I take it that these are all salary figures for an MFE or Quant? Would those figures be possible to attain (with years of experience) if I got a general Masters in Finance or MBA? Would those figures require that I work 80+ hours per week for the first 5 years I work or is there a 40ish hour per week option? Would getting an MBA or Masters in Finance in my 40's present me with a lot of ageism discrimination where getting those higher paying jobs in my 40's will be a challenge?

Any suggestions on other career paths that can lead to these $200k-$500k type jobs? Surgeon?

My fall back would be a psychiatric mental health nurser practitioner (PMHNP) which can make up to $140,000 but if I worked a lot of different jobs (travel nursing) it's possible to make $200k. If I got ICU experience, I could go for my Nurse Anesthesia definitely makes over $200k. Medical school would be a natural choice but I'd be in school till I'm near 50 years of age. I'll be a broke student for the rest of my 40's, which is a problem since I'm still single and would like to have a family some day soon. Working 80+ hours per week would also make it hard to start a family since I would be guaranteed to be celibate for those 5 years of starting out in finance working 80+ hours per week.

 

[Michsund]

Joy, Michsund, Jamal. I take it that these are all salary figures for an MFE or Quant? Would those figures be possible to attain (with years of experience) if I got a general Masters in Finance or MBA? Would those figures require that I work 80+ hours per week for the first 5 years I work or is there a 40ish hour per week option? Would getting an MBA or Masters in Finance in my 40's present me with a lot of ageism discrimination where getting those higher paying jobs in my 40's will be a challenge?

Any suggestions on other career paths that can lead to these $200k-$500k type jobs? Surgeon?

My fall back would be a psychiatric mental health nurser practitioner (PMHNP) which can make up to $140,000 but if I worked a lot of different jobs (travel nursing) it's possible to make $200k. If I got ICU experience, I could go for my Nurse Anesthesia definitely makes over $200k. Medical school would be a natural choice but I'd be in school till I'm near 50 years of age. I'll be a broke student for the rest of my 40's, which is a problem since I'm still single and would like to have a family some day soon. Working 80+ hours per week would also make it hard to start a family since I would be guaranteed to be celibate for those 5 years of starting out in finance working 80+ hours per week.

You don’t have to work a job to get rich. It’s possibly the worst way to get rich. Maybe you should look into something you like and run a business in that field. For example I like shoes and high end clothing so I run a part time ebay/other market shoe and clothing store which brings in decent money. If I invested more and went all out I know I can make more money. I would recommend finding something you love and try making a career out of it. Find a problem and try to see if you have a solution for it.

 

[JamalTheTrader]

Joy, Michsund, Jamal. I take it that these are all salary figures for an MFE or Quant? Would those figures be possible to attain (with years of experience) if I got a general Masters in Finance or MBA? Would those figures require that I work 80+ hours per week for the first 5 years I work or is there a 40ish hour per week option? Would getting an MBA or Masters in Finance in my 40's present me with a lot of ageism discrimination where getting those higher paying jobs in my 40's will be a challenge?

Any suggestions on other career paths that can lead to these $200k-$500k type jobs? Surgeon?

My fall back would be a psychiatric mental health nurser practitioner (PMHNP) which can make up to $140,000 but if I worked a lot of different jobs (travel nursing) it's possible to make $200k. If I got ICU experience, I could go for my Nurse Anesthesia definitely makes over $200k. Medical school would be a natural choice but I'd be in school till I'm near 50 years of age. I'll be a broke student for the rest of my 40's, which is a problem since I'm still single and would like to have a family some day soon. Working 80+ hours per week would also make it hard to start a family since I would be guaranteed to be celibate for those 5 years of starting out in finance working 80+ hours per week.

For most jobs in business, starting salary is similar, but then everyone diverges. There so many different kinds of positions with different responsibilities. So it's hard to predict what you're making say after 5 or 10 years of experience. I'm not sure about MFE or Quant since I haven't started yet, but studying in a Business School, I can tell you 40ish week options are very rare out of MBA. I think consulting might be least workload (and it does pay good, so you might want to investigate), but you travel a lot and workload is inconsistent. Even then, I'm not sure if they average 40 hours weeks. Generally, you have to remember most important positions are working to earn profits or accomplish projects. Sure you can stop after 8 hours every day, but things still need to be done by deadlines. Although, I think Actuaries work 40 hour weeks. I'm not sure how much they make though.

I do think if you want stability and consistent high earning power, Medical school is the way to go. The profession has a very high floor and the average doctor definitely makes more than the average person in finance. Maybe, like some people say even over 90% of the people in business. Furthermore, its very stable and isn't affected by business cycles. Of course the catch is that it is expensive to get through Med school.

You don’t have to work a job to get rich. It’s possibly the worst way to get rich. Maybe you should look into something you like and run a business in that field. For example I like shoes and high end clothing so I run a part time ebay/other market shoe and clothing store which brings in decent money. If I invested more and went all out I know I can make more money. I would recommend finding something you love and try making a career out of it. Find a problem and try to see if you have a solution for it.

Well, running a business can potentially be rewarding, but it entails high risk. Most people starting businesses make very little. Ony a few succeed. A salaried job is at least fairly secure.

That being said, I do agree, you will never make a lot of money working for someone else. You have to have some equity or profit sharing partnership and be working for yourself. Most salaried jobs have caps under a million a year.

I personally think the most efficient way to earn money is to work a regular job and invest your savings into etfs. Then you can put all your efforts into your primary occupation and make a consistent salary, while earning some interest that takes little time and effort.

 

[Michsund]

For most jobs in business, starting salary is similar, but then everyone diverges. There so many different kinds of positions with different responsibilities. So it's hard to predict what you're making say after 5 or 10 years of experience. I'm not sure about MFE or Quant since I haven't started yet, but studying in a Business School, I can tell you 40ish week options are very rare out of MBA. I think consulting might be least workload (and it does pay good, so you might want to investigate), but you travel a lot and workload is inconsistent. Even then, I'm not sure if they average 40 hours weeks. Generally, you have to remember most important positions are working to earn profits or accomplish projects. Sure you can stop after 8 hours every day, but things still need to be done by deadlines. Although, I think Actuaries work 40 hour weeks. I'm not sure how much they make though.

I do think if you want stability and consistent high earning power, Medical school is the way to go. The profession has a very high floor and the average doctor definitely makes more than the average person in finance. Maybe, like some people say even over 90% of the people in business. Furthermore, its very stable and isn't affected by business cycles. Of course the catch is that it is expensive to get through Med school.



Well, running a business can potentially be rewarding, but it entails high risk. Most people starting businesses make very little. Ony a few succeed. A salaried job is at least fairly secure.

That being said, I do agree, you will never make a lot of money working for someone else. You have to have some equity or profit sharing partnership and be working for yourself. Most salaried jobs have caps under a million a year.

I personally think the most efficient way to earn money is to work a regular job and invest your savings into etfs. Then you can put all your efforts into your primary occupation and make a consistent salary, while earning some interest that takes little time and effort.

I forgot about actuary this is a great low stress field which makes good salary. I would look into it.

 

[PepeQuant]

OP only cares about money but there is nothing wrong with that. But quant doesn’t make much as OP thinks.. even if you are in the FO, at least not for average quants.

I recently find out that a manager at Facebook type of tech company can make 400k. Does someone have any resource to confirm that.

400k is sorta Director pay for “average quant”. And it usually takes at least 6-8 years to achieve that. Apparently “this guy” gets to manager in tech in 4 years.

 

[Andy Nguyen]

There are industries that pay more than finance. Think AI, tech, etc but you gotta be top of the game. You can't just thinking getting an MFE degree and then money will follow. Many people realize it a year and 100K too late.

 

[PepeQuant]

This is the problem of chasing the unicorn. When quant is hot, everyone is chasing it and market can’t digest all these MFE grads and market price end up this low... this seems to same trend as data science.. with open source packaging, nowadays it is possible to write your own neural net which actually works without deep understanding of the subject matters. As Andy said, when you realize this field is hot, it is 100k too late...

 

[Mikey V]

This is the problem of chasing the unicorn. When quant is hot, everyone is chasing it and market can’t digest all these MFE grads and market price end up this low... this seems to same trend as data science.. with open source packaging, nowadays it is possible to write your own neural net which actually works without deep understanding of the subject matters. As Andy said, when you realize this field is hot, it is 100k too late...

Why can't a quant just go to tech if he makes more there then?

 

[PepeQuant]

Why can't a quant just go to tech if he makes more there then?

There is truth not being told in this industry. Not many of the quants can write decent codes. In fact most of the quants write shit quality of the code. Some of them don’t even write code (Risk, vetting, etc).

I was a technologist before quant. The work is similar but quite different. In a large system, you need to write code which is scallable and stable. I have seen quants don’t know how to use “mutable” properly which causes tons of thread issue used in production..

 

[Daniel Duffy]

aka Software Design, Software as a discipline, not an optional add-on..

“A Big Ball of Mud is a haphazardly structured, sprawling, sloppy, duct-tape-and-baling-wire, spaghetti-code jungle. These systems show unmistakable signs of unregulated growth, and repeated, expedient repair. Information is shared promiscuously among distant elements of the system, often to the point where nearly all the important information becomes global or duplicated. The overall structure of the system may never have been well defined. If it was, it may have eroded beyond recognition. Programmers with a shred of architectural sensibility shun these quagmires. Only those who are unconcerned about architecture, and, perhaps, are comfortable with the inertia of the day-to-day chore of patching the holes in these failing dikes, are content to work on such systems.”

It is desirable to achieve a programming performance such that creating a program meets its specifications, is on schedule, is adaptable for the future and runs efficiently.[2] Being able to satisfy all these goals at a low cost is a difficult and common problem in software engineering and project management. By understanding the psychological aspects of computer programming, we can better understand how to achieve a higher programming performance, and to assist programmers to produce better software with less error.

Software maintenance costs yuge $.

 

[jah.david.kim]

For most jobs in business, starting salary is similar, but then everyone diverges. There so many different kinds of positions with different responsibilities. So it's hard to predict what you're making say after 5 or 10 years of experience. I'm not sure about MFE or Quant since I haven't started yet, but studying in a Business School, I can tell you 40ish week options are very rare out of MBA. I think consulting might be least workload (and it does pay good, so you might want to investigate), but you travel a lot and workload is inconsistent. Even then, I'm not sure if they average 40 hours weeks. Generally, you have to remember most important positions are working to earn profits or accomplish projects. Sure you can stop after 8 hours every day, but things still need to be done by deadlines. Although, I think Actuaries work 40 hour weeks. I'm not sure how much they make though.

I do think if you want stability and consistent high earning power, Medical school is the way to go. The profession has a very high floor and the average doctor definitely makes more than the average person in finance. Maybe, like some people say even over 90% of the people in business. Furthermore, its very stable and isn't affected by business cycles. Of course the catch is that it is expensive to get through Med school.
Well, running a business can potentially be rewarding, but it entails high risk. Most people starting businesses make very little. Ony a few succeed. A salaried job is at least fairly secure.

That being said, I do agree, you will never make a lot of money working for someone else. You have to have some equity or profit sharing partnership and be working for yourself. Most salaried jobs have caps under a million a year.

I personally think the most efficient way to earn money is to work a regular job and invest your savings into etfs. Then you can put all your efforts into your primary occupation and make a consistent salary, while earning some interest that takes little time and effort.

__>
________________________________My Response--->
Yeah, I was looking at consulting when I was considering leaving my PhD program. But from my research, they do seem to still put in a lot of hours and travel a lot. This aspect deterred me. I kind of shut that door when I left my PhD in Nursing program (because PhD's can do consulting also).

I definitely have looked at the medial school route and I still partially am considering it but the biggest problem I have with going to medical school is how long it takes. I'm 41 right now and will still have $160,000 after my loan repayment program is through. I'd be in medical school from say 43 till 47. I'd be poor through that time. I'd be a resident from 47 till 51. I would only make $60,000 as a psychiatry resident.

If I were to do medical school, the rest of my life would suffer for I really don't do well keeping up with friends and the initiation and maintenance of romantic relationships. I'm still single at 41 due to me having been in school for 17 years of my adult life.

I'm thinking of going for my Nurse Anesthetist because they make an average of $213,000 in California. I just have to get at least 1 year of ICU experience but most successful applicants have 4-5 years of experience and it's very competitive to get into that those programs. But it's only 3 years of school and they make as much as many doctors.

_
I have 29 months of a GI Bill I need to use by November 2022 so I want to use it to get another degree. The mindset is to get a degree that will have the maximum earning potential and doesn't have a ceiling like nurse practitioners do. You suggest going into business. I might do a degree that will help that business but that would be a lot of extra stuff to think about when time is running out because I don't have an idea for any business right now. I do have about two years of my Illinois Veteran's Grant that I can come back to IL for in the future, in the case that I want to another degree program that'll help future business endeavors.

Yes. I have considered how I can become an actuary with a finance degree and that's what I might considering going for if I want to do my Masters in Finance and study for my certifications to become an actuary. Actuary's make an average of $128,987 but I've seen salaries as high as $250,000 online.

 

[Mikey V]

I was thinking how great it is to have your cake and eat it too. Perhaps an option is you do the degree (if you decide MBA I’m quite sure this is feasible) online and do travel nursing to make some more cash as you get through school.