The job of a financial engineer has started to become an especially popular role in various financial sectors, such as the stock market, hedge funds, and insurance companies.
Financial engineers usually have a specific financial engineering certification as well as a degree in any of the fields of maths, computer science, and finance and are highly proficient in those fields. They are experts that are high in demand in the areas of investing and wealth management.
Coding Ability
To be a good financial engineer, a robust knowledge of computer programming, especially coding, is vital. A quant should be able to show how systems function, as well as creating programs and databases of their own. This is a key skill in financial engineering.
One of the key skills in computer programming within financial engineering is the ability to produce and use algorithmic trading programs. To do this, quant analysts should be knowledgeable in some of the more popular programming languages, such as Python, C++, and Java.
These are some of the popular languages used to program financial applications and databases, there are various different languages used that aren’t listed here, so it is best practice to be fairly knowledgeable across a variety of programming languages.
Businesses That Hire Financial Engineers
Financial engineers use maths and finance skills to create financial models utilised to complete a variety of financial tasks and predictions. Financial engineers are generally paid decent salaries due to the high-skilled nature of the role.
· Trading & equity research
Equity researchers assess prospective deals to assist the company they work for with making sensible investment decisions. They use problem-solving skills, data analysis, and financial engineering to recognise the feasibility of trades and transactions. This usually includes evaluating data about a specific stock in relation to its market activity.
· Portfolio Managers & Traders
Financial engineers with trading and portfolio management backgrounds are usually employed by wealth management firms, insurance brokers, and investment banks. They oversee the management of investment portfolios for clients. A portfolio management role is usually liable for all aspects of investment portfolios.
· Venture Capital Firms
Venture capital companies do business primarily with start-up companies and fund them in the anticipation that the start-up becomes successful, and they get a nice return on their investment.
However, these can be risky choices as the majority of start-up companies tend to go bust, especially in tech industries. This can be a business in which financial engineers prove to be extremely useful, as they can analyse all available data and make declarations of whether investing in a certain start-up is an intelligent decision.
How To Get Into Financial Engineering
A standout financial engineering course is the Certificate of Quantitative Finance (CQF). The CQF was created for people with finance skills choosing to advance their current career, or start a new one. It is taught by some of the best professionals in the financial engineering industry across the globe, as well as renowned professors in the fields of finance, maths, and computer science.
