Hi everyone,
A bit about me - please skip this paragraph if you're not interested. I have a masters of finance degree and enjoy finance a lot, but haven't worked in the industry. I've been at a big 4 accting firm the past year. I recently developed a real interest in math, but lack a strong background in it, so I've been taking math courses while I work to build up my knowledge. I started with multivariable and am currently on Diff Eqs. I hope to take PDEs, real analysis, and advanced calc next. I'm thinking about getting a 1 year masters of straight math afterwards (not financial math), and trying to see about landing a finance job (quant or otherwise) coming out of it, based on my performance in it and my prior work exp/finance degree. It's possible that if I cannot find a job I want, I will try to go right into a fin math program and see what comes of it. It's a lot of school I know but it's what happens when you develop such an interest in math fin at 24 with no background in math.
Now for my question: I was watching a youtube video where the speaker was the head of NYU's math fin program. He was giving an overview of math fin today, and mentioned that most graduates out of masters of math fin degrees go to work as "traders' assistants" at ibanks and hedge funds. He said that this was certainly true for nyu's math fin program.
I'm just wondering, what does he mean by "trader" in this context? I hope this isn't someone simply executing the trades others tell him to, or simply doing some sort of trade cost minimization. I take it that in most cases this is someone developing quantitative models/trading strategies? Is that the kind of trader the head of NYU's program is speaking of when he says that most of NYU's math fin graduates become "traders' assistants"? What do you think that means exactly?
Thank you all for your time.
A bit about me - please skip this paragraph if you're not interested. I have a masters of finance degree and enjoy finance a lot, but haven't worked in the industry. I've been at a big 4 accting firm the past year. I recently developed a real interest in math, but lack a strong background in it, so I've been taking math courses while I work to build up my knowledge. I started with multivariable and am currently on Diff Eqs. I hope to take PDEs, real analysis, and advanced calc next. I'm thinking about getting a 1 year masters of straight math afterwards (not financial math), and trying to see about landing a finance job (quant or otherwise) coming out of it, based on my performance in it and my prior work exp/finance degree. It's possible that if I cannot find a job I want, I will try to go right into a fin math program and see what comes of it. It's a lot of school I know but it's what happens when you develop such an interest in math fin at 24 with no background in math.
Now for my question: I was watching a youtube video where the speaker was the head of NYU's math fin program. He was giving an overview of math fin today, and mentioned that most graduates out of masters of math fin degrees go to work as "traders' assistants" at ibanks and hedge funds. He said that this was certainly true for nyu's math fin program.
I'm just wondering, what does he mean by "trader" in this context? I hope this isn't someone simply executing the trades others tell him to, or simply doing some sort of trade cost minimization. I take it that in most cases this is someone developing quantitative models/trading strategies? Is that the kind of trader the head of NYU's program is speaking of when he says that most of NYU's math fin graduates become "traders' assistants"? What do you think that means exactly?
Thank you all for your time.
