How to get a Job as a Trader with a Professional Trading Firm
“Where do I start – I’ve got no experience…”
It’s not HARD to get experience. Anyone can open an account and start to trade.
The applicants that turn up to trading firm interviews and think they can rely on pure maths ability and then don’t get in are, in my opinion, like turning up to a Hollywood acting agent and saying: “Right, I’d like to star in films please…I’m good looking”.
Have you taken any acting classes? (in trading terms, gone to seminars or read extensively on the subject)
Have you actually acted before? Even if it was an amateur production, have you applied to theatres, read The Stage, gone to auditions, been cast in roles, been on stage or even in student films? (in trading terms the equivalent of opening an account, trying to trade, learning what works, getting actual experience)
Proprietary trading firms have high application requirements for one simple reason: because they can. There are thousands of people who would love to be a trader, and for every single training vacancy there are at least 500-1,000 hopefuls who will apply for it. I have personally seen a single ad for a trading position posted on efinancialcareers fill an entire filing cabinet drawer with CV’s every time the ad was run each quarter. Competition is very high.
Being a maths phd or programming master is not necessary in order to be a good trader however, and a trading firm is unlikely to be that bothered about your qualifications *if* there is a realistic prospect that you are going to make them a lot of money.
Any good trading firm will look past your education (or lack of) if they can see your genuine interest and an actual trading ability – by looking at the P&L records of your account. But it will take you time and persistence to get a track record, and to find an opportunity to get a foot in the door. “The City may be racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-semitic, wheel-chairist, maybe even ageist but first and foremost, they are capitalist and if you can make them a fortune, all prejudices disappear, as if by magic. Don’t be put off.”
1. First and foremost. If you are useless at maths but confident in your trading ability and can demonstrate a minimum of 6-12 months consistency with real money and account statements to back it up. Even if you have not made a great deal of money, a prop firm will consider seriously whether to back you. So if this sounds like you and you want it enough, start contacting them. There is a list of firms in the directory on this site.
2. You want a job as a trader but you have no experience. Then go and get some. You can teach yourself almost anything these days and the best way is to actively get involved. Read the Trader Training section of this site and start educating yourself. Open an account: whether it is futures, options or spreadbetting - start trading. It’s not hard to open an account and these days doesnt require a fortune either. It doesn’t matter whether you are a total failure at least you are giving it a go and you are looking at how prices move. And within no time at all you are already starting to LEARN about the issues that traders face. Fundamental analysis, technical analysis, emotional analysis; greed and fear. Worst case scenario you lose a little money but you have some actual experience to impart and you look INTERESTED. Imagine you’re the recruitment officer at a firm. You’ve got a candidate infront of you and you ask: “So, why do you want to be a trader?” and they reply: “Well, I’m very interested in the financial markets…” Woah. Let’s stop you there. You’re so interested but you never even bothered to actually trade anything yourself?
3. Read books on the markets. I firmly believe you shouldn’t turn up at an interview without having read “Reminiscences of a Stock Operator” and “Market Wizards” at a minimum. Neither of those books will turn you into a super trader but they do give you an insight into what this job is like, how hard it is, how much effort you put in, how wrong things can go despite the effort you put in and these two books are also the most talked about trading books out there, so if you want to look interested in your field, then you want to have read them.
4. Read the Wall Street Journal OR the FT so that you know what is going on in the world of business and finance. Try and have an opinion. Don’t be afraid of being wrong. The best traders are wrong all the time. I heard of someone that applied for a position as a FTSE trader and was asked where he thought the price of Soybeans was going. What has that got to do with the FTSE? Not a lot. But most good firms want to know that you have an insight into world events and their correlation: Right now the the US is MORE interested in boosting the economy than fighting inflation. What does this mean for interest rates? If interest rates go down where are bond prices going? Where is the countries currency going? What could this do to commodity prices? Imagine if a recruitment officer asked you: “If commmodities like oil go up what happens to the European indices like the FTSE and the DAX?”. Candidate A answers: “Well, inflation is bad for the economy. Higher prices are more likely to result in companies making less profits. The lower profits would cause investors to sell stock and the Europeans markets would fall.” Candidate B answers: “Well, inflation is bad for the economy. Higher prices are more likely to result in companies making less profits. The lower profits would cause investors to sell stock and the Europeans markets would fall. BUT oil companies are a large component of the FTSE and since their profits would likely be up there is a case for arguing that the FTSE may still fall but LESS than the DAX…” who would you hire?
5 Brush up on your maths and your general mental agility. I personally don’t think Maths is at all important for trading outrights and I’ve yet to be proven wrong BUT it’s an unfortunate fact of life that you’re going to have to sit aptitude tests at firms. The maths tests and the aptitude tests that you get set at firms are not PURELY to test your maths ability. They are to test how you react under pressure. Do you keep calm or do you go to pieces? Learn to add, subtract, divide and multiply long numbers, quickly. Get a simple maths book, and work through it, and better still complement that by picking up a copy of Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking
>Go to Free Trader Training Page>
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