Acing the Quant Interview
A comprehensive guide on how to break into the world of quantitative finance, pass the interviews and land the job.
In 2013, Forbes famously released an article titled “Quants: The Rocket Scientists of Wall Street”. In the article, they uncovered the secretive field of quantitative finance and awakened the world to a group of individuals that leveraged algorithmic trading to derive alpha in the financial markets. This article, alongside many other written pieces, has contributed to the rapid growth and publicity of the field of quantitative finance. As a result, there are now more students and professionals trying to enter the field than ever before.
The rising competition to enter the field of quantitative finance has come with many benefits and downsides. While compensation has drastically increased and has become more public, the interview process has also gotten increasingly more challenging. In this article, I aim to break down the various components involved in the quantitative finance interview and provide you with a series of proven resources to help in your interview preparation. However, I will also cover various other components that must be optimized in order to obtain the opportunity to interview in the first place.
The material that I cover in this article will pertain to both jobs and internships in quantitative finance. Additionally, I will include information that applies to all quant roles: researcher, trader, developer, and analyst. If there are any additional resources that you think I should include, please leave them in the comments below.
Applying to Quant Jobs / Internships
The first step in applying to quantitative finance jobs is to perfect your resume so that a recruiter will extend you the invitation to interview. Here, it is very important that you optimize your resume so that the recruiter is easily able to quickly scan it and find the key information that they are looking for. This optimization comes in two forms:
- Formatting the resume. Since quantitative finance tends to be very academic in nature, you will want to have a resume that mirrors the LaTeX style often used in academic research papers. If you are already comfortable using LaTeX, you may write the resume yourself. However, you may also choose to use this free website if you would like to build a professional LaTeX-themed resume for free.
- Including keywords. For quantitative trading and quantitative researcher positions, you should tailor your resume to focus on your statistics and mathematics skills. This includes specifying your performance in competitive math competitions, high standardized test scores, data analysis projects, and statistics coursework. Conversely, if you are applying for a quant developer role, you should focus on highlighting your knowledge of computer science theory, your previous programming experience, and any side projects you may have built.
Once you have completed your resume, you are ready to begin looking for new roles. If you are currently a student, one of the best resources to find jobs in quantitative finance is through recruiting that may happen on your campus. This could take place through various clubs (ex: Traders at Berkely) or school events (CMU On-Campus Recruiting). At these events, it is recommended that you find out whether there is someone that is able to provide you with a referral, as this is the surest way to land the interview.
Outside of on-campus events, the next best option is to apply to quantitative finance roles through various job boards. While you can leverage Indeed or LinkedIn, these tend to be flooded with many irrelevant job posts. As a result, I highly recommend OpenQuant for finding the best jobs and internships in quantitative finance. They have high-quality, specialized positions from the majority of the major quant firms in the United States and around the world.
Preparing to Pass the Quant Interview
Quantitative finance interviews span many topics: statistics, mathematics, computer science, and finance. It’s important that you have practice in each of these domains in order to do well in the interviews. Below, I’ll break down what questions may appear and what resources you can use to practice.
Statistics and Probability
Statistics is the underpinning of many concepts and applications of quantitative finance. For this portion of the interview, you should ensure that you first have a solid foundation in basic statistics. This could come in many forms but here are a few good resources:
- MIT Introduction to Statistics — an open-source, introductory course in the foundations of statistics.
- StatQuest — StatQuest has a series of statistics playlists if you just need a refresher on some core concepts.
- NakedStatistics — Good for building a strong intuition of statistical concepts rather than diving deep into mathematics.
Once you have a good understanding of statistics, you’ll want to next focus on mastering probability. Probability-style questions are very frequent in quantitative interviews, and being successful in these questions will require a deeper understanding that you won’t find in the above resources. For these questions, I recommend the following resources:
- BrainStellar — Has a series of probability questions that you can use to practice for what you may see in the interview.
- A Practical Guide to Quantitative Finance Interviews — This book is often referred to as “The Green Book” and is the most widely referenced book for preparing for quantitative finance interviews.
The final concept in statistics that you should be familiar with is machine learning and data analysis. This is especially important if you are applying for a quantitative researcher or quantitative analyst role. The best resource for learning about these concepts is “An Introduction to Statistical Learning” which is commonly regarded as the Bible of data science. While this book is fantastic, reading it alone will not be enough. You’ll have to dabble in creating your own data analysis/ML projects in order to really grasp the concepts.
Mental Math + Brainteasers + Market Making
Quant firms love to ask mental math questions to gauge your speed and mathematical aptitude. There’s really only one way to study for these questions and that is solving more practice problems. Speed is paramount for these problems, so you’ll want to practice solving these questions very quickly. Two great resources for these interviews are ZetaMac and RankYourBrain.
Similar to the mental math style questions, the best way to get better at brain teasers is through practicing more problems. “Heard on the Street” is a great book if you’re looking to find many of the most commonly asked brain teasers in quantitative finance. The trick to these questions is to begin understanding the patterns that reemerge.
Market making is another concept that also shows up in many quantitative trader interviews. One good resource to practice these types of questions is Figgie — a game created by Jane Street to train your skills in market making.
Programming and Algorithmic Questions
Programming questions tend to appear primarily in quant researcher/developer roles but to varying degrees of difficulty. For both roles, you may be asked algorithmic/data structure style questions. You can find a list of these practice problems organized by firm on Leetcode.
If you’re applying for a quantitative developer role, you will be asked many additional questions in relation to this topic. Many firms use C++ as their primary programming language and therefore you may be asked about very low-level or advanced C++ concepts during your interviews. Awesome Modern C++ is a great resource for learning more about these concepts.
Thanks for reading this article. If you enjoyed it, feel free to share it with a friend to help them with their upcoming quantitative finance interviews. Best of luck!
