Hey guys im asking for your advice, if you were in my situation. I graduated from a large state university with a degree in finance and have been a prop trader for the past 2 years. I have internship experience with a MM bank for IB and consulting internship experience. I’ve also pitched equities for a small fund and know my way around financial modeling. I would like to break into IB, ER or pretty much any analyst position with a fund or MM bank but i am having trouble getting interviews and i think its because im sending my resume to the wrong people.
Do you guys have any advice on how i could get my resume seen by the right people?
I’m sorry. I usually go directly thru the company website. I agree that there aren’t many skills that can be transferred and thats part of the reason why im looking to change careers. I fear that the longer i stay a trader, the harder it would be for me to break into ER or IB down the line.
It will be tough to go from prop trading to some analyst/associate role in IB or research
Doing CFA levels should help a little, as well as framing your prop trading experience to be more relevant. But you might have to go for a MSF or MBA to reset your career options since you’re already 2 years in.
But the risk is that it won’t be a long-term career and you won’t have much to do after it’s over like athletes and rock stars when their careers end. Trading doesn’t give you transferable skills.
Definitely! But i have come to realize that i’d much rather be in research or valuation, which is where i got my career start. I’ll continue to trade but still actively searching for opportunities. Haven’t had any luck so far.
In terms of ranking of usefullness, company page is the standard that will be screened with. linkedin depends on the internal recruiter, but I’d say slightly less useful, because it’s generally not checked as frequently.
cover letters are useless. they’re only read (if read at all) as tools to ding people. as long as you can intelligently articulate and make your case without atrocious grammer, spelling mistakes, or come off as way too cocky or too timind, you’ll be fine. old school, plain jane formatting,
for smaller companies, cover letter has more of an impact, and read more diligently.
I used to agree with Itera’s first paragraph. But in my recent search, I noticed every single interviewer I sat down with had sections of my cover letter highlighted and they asked some good questions on those points. I’ve always put in the time on the cover letter but I figured it was a big waste. It seems as things get more competitive though, the cover letter may be a tie breaking point between being candidate #5 and getting a round 1 interview or being candidate #6 and meeting the bottom of a trash can.
And I do agree the smaller the company, the more it seemed like they went through the whole resume/cover submission.