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  1. How easy/hard would it be to get a paid research assistant position at an U.S. university you haven't studied at (more specifically finance faculty)? How should one go about looking for these positions, just cold e-mail profs with research interests that are up your alley to see if they would be able to offer you such position? Let's assume visa is not a problem, and minimum wage is acceptable compensation. My motivation for this would be to firstly get more finance research experience to make me more competitive candidate for applications next round, secondly to get a U.S. school with known brand name in my resume to give my application more legitimacy (my M.Sc is from European school, high quality but fairly unknown in U.S.) and finally to get a at least one more stellar LOR. As far as background goes, I'm a recent MSF graduate with outstanding grades and a bit of research experience from M.Sc thesis and other individual research projects - no actual RA experience to speak of but strong motivation to learn.
  2. Thank you once again for the insights. Re LORS: The strongest of the three letter writers can definitely attest to the rigor of the program and is the guy who has been pushing graduates from this school to the top programs. I can get another good letter from a prof who taught me stochastic calculus, so he can attest to my technical abilities, and a prof from one of the profs in the exchange school who can hopefully benchmark my performance against my US peers during undergrad. I'll try to get myself involved with some research these profs are working on, and hope for the best. What do you think would be a more feasible range of schools? Do you think e.g. UC Irvine, Rochester and Emory would be more feasible given my profile? The profiles to those schools, in terms of GPA etc., seem to be historically lower than mine, but of course many of those students have the benefit of having their MA from US University, hence my question.
  3. Thank you for the honest feedback. What do you see as the biggest weakness of my profile? Although the school I'm attending for my maters is not one of the best, it has a solid finance program and has placed students in T10 before - I'm not realistically expecting this, because I've simply had less time to build a profile, but just to put things into perspective. So is the biggest problem that I don't have any research experience with professors? There is still 5 months to go until the deadlines approach - I could potentially mitigate this to some extent by looking to get a few months in some project and possibly prop up one of the letters at the same time. If it is the lack of math courses, would a solid rec letter from a financial engineering prof and retaking GRE help? Or is it something entirely different that I'm not seeing? I have also completed one of the projects during my UG exchange, in one of the target schools, and I'll try to have this prof write a letter for me as well. The thesis I've written also draws heavily from the works of one of the tenured professors at another target school, and I could potentially contact him ahead of time to put my name out there. Would any of this help me in improving my odds of nailing a spot in a solid US school? I'm afraid Europe won't work for personal reasons, so if it seems like this is a hopeless project then I guess I'd just be better off focusing my efforts on industry instead.
  4. Test Scores (GMAT/GRE): GRE Q167, V159, AWA4 Undegrad GPA: 4.12/5.00. B.Sc in finance, T30 B-School in Europe, exchange semester in T30 US school. Graduate GPA: 5.00/5.00. M.Sc in finance, same school, exchange semester in T5 B-School in Canada. B.Sc+M.Sc completed in near record time (more than one year ahead of target time). No grade inflation in this school to speak of, I'll most likely be the only student to graduate with a perfect GPA this year. Will make sure both points are addressed in at least one of my LORs. M.Sc course work heavily concentrated on asset pricing, limited amount of mathematically heavy stuff but the ones I took I always finished at the top of the class with full marks. Research Experience: Multiple individual research projects for courses, completed under 3 different professors. Nothing published, no RA experience. Individual research papers include e.g. Master's Thesis (70+ pages, graded 5/5). Teaching Experience: None Work Experience: Internship trading derivatives LORs: One solid, a couple of choises to pick for the other two. I'm thinking of using the connections established during the exchange semesters to benchmark myself against the quality of students in the schools I am applying to. Why PhD: I enjoy doing research and the freedom to pick the projects based on my interest and setting deadlines myself (I end up working much harder this way, hence my quick graduation). Research interest: Empirical asset pricing Concentration Applying to: T30ish Finance programs in US, heavy emphasis on West Coast. This includes at least Stanford, Berkeley, USC, UCLA, UCSD, Cal Tech, McCombs +couple of reaches based on research interests and connections my thesis advisor has, incl. UChicago, Duke, Columbia. Number of programs planned to apply to: ~15 Dream Schools: Stanford, Berkeley Concerns: Due to my quick graduation and multiple exchange semesters I never really had time to gain RA experience or establish strong connections with more than one professor. This will most likely show up as a lack of 3 outstanding letters - I don't know how much outstanding GPA and the volunatarily chosen individual research projects will make up for this, and whether this will make applying to T10 schools a fools errand altogether. I am also slightly concerned of funding, i.e. as an international student I will not be able to work outside of school during summers (in US at least), and don't know how much exactly can I expect schools like USC/UCLA to provide in funding and if tihs will be even remotely close to what is required to live in LA. I am willing to take on debt if that is what it takes though - all the more motivation to work harder.
  5. Hello all, Long story short, I have been planning on completing a PhD for a while now (I enjoy doing research and like the idea of gaining high expertise in a specific area of my choosing), but lately I have started to realize that I probably enjoy doing econ research more and PhD in econ would open up more doors for me while still giving me a chance to fulfill my interest in the interaction of financial markets and macro. I have outstanding academic record in a well regarded European university (not quite T10 but close), with a M.Sc in Finance. However, my program didn't include any formal math coursework, i.e. I don't have a single course in calculus etc. I have a couple of master's courses in Finance that use stochastic calculus, and some stat's courses (incl. one advanced course in econometrics), all of which I aced with the highest possible grade. I have a few individual research papers under my belt (UG+G theses, couple of papers written for courses), but no RA experience or publications. I understand, that the odds of me getting an admission with this profile in a reputable econ PhD program are few an far between, and thus a second masters in Econ before pursuing a PhD would seem like a natural choice to get some formal math training under my belt, signal my commitment to econ and most importantly to get some research experience. I am thus wondering what would be my chances of getting admitted to a T20 MS in mathematical econ/econometrics program in US? (More mathematical tracks would hopefully provide a strong signal of my mathematical capabilities and I have a minor in econ and out of personal interets have familiarized myself with a lot of the M.Sc macro content so I am no stranger to economic theory) To summarize my profile: M.Sc (Finance) GPA: 4.0/4.0 in a ~T20 European program Research experience: Couple of individual research papers, no RA experience or publications GRE/GMAT: Haven't taken yet but comparing to scores my peers have managed to get I am confident I'll do very well. LORs: Should get a solid one from grad thesis supervisor, can get two more that are good but not outstanding. Other: Graduated ~year ahead of time - probably doesn't matter but could potentially signal strong work ethic All comments are greatly appreciated!
  6. I am looking for some idea on what range of schools should I be aiming for. Will be applying for fall 2017 entry, finance. Test Scores (GMAT/GRE): Will take after summer, confident I'll ace at least quant. Undegrad GPA: ~4.1/5.0 Graduate GPA: 5.0/5.0 Research Experience: UG Thesis, couple of 20+ page research papers for courses, 60+ page Master's Thesis. Outstanding grades for all. No RA work so far, will look to get some under my belt this fall. Teaching Experience: None Work Experience: Asset management/sales related, under a year. I've also passed CFA Level 1 test for what its worth. LORs: One solid (thesis advisor, has connections in US), other two are still work in progress. Might try to play up my international experience and get letters from profs who supervised my research papers during exchange (both seemed very satisfied/impressed with the work I did) but I'd imagine these will be good at best. Concentration Applying to: Finance Number of programs planned to apply to: ~10 Dream Schools: Planning on applying to at least Stanford, Berkley, UCLA, UCSD, Duke, U of Texas Austin and about 5ish more, probably inc. couple of dream schools and two safer picks What made you want to pursue a PhD: I enjoy doing research and have no problem with doing big projects on my own. PhD is also a gateway to pretty much all jobs I'm interested in finance, whether it'll be industry or academia. Concerns you have about your profile: My B.Sc and M.Sc (both finance) are from a very solid European University but it isn't usually ranked that highly, around T20-50 in Europe depending on which ranking you wan't to believe. I got two study abroad semesters under my belt, one in T20-30 US University and other in T3 Canadian MBA program. How much these will make up for the lack of name of my home Uni is unclear to me. I have also crushed the degree in pretty much record time, over one year under the target time, and will graduate at the top of my class given my perfect GPA. Any additional specific questions you may have: Like I mentioned in the beginning, I'm looking to get an idea of the range of schools I should be applying to and the chances I have at the schools I mentioned earlier. Any ideas of what I can do with my profile before winter, except for the obvious (ace my GMAT, secure good LORs, get more research experience)?
  7. You can complete the course work in Aalto in one year, so I'd imagine that can make it easier to graduate early, but I'd say most still take more than 5 unless they are in a hurry. IMO faculty is also great, we got lot of profs who could be teaching/have teached in top schools in the States but choose to be here nowadays for family reasons. Feel free to shoot me a PM if you have more questions.
  8. If one goes to industry after finishing his quals, is there any turning back from this decision? Can you still return to the same program and just get back to your dissertation, or do you get booted out of the program after a certain number of years that you have been out of school? Specifically considering Finance, in case there are significant differences between fields.
  9. Background & motivation for applying: Finance student in top university in Nordics (Europe). I want to break into asset management in US and have interest in more quantitative funds, many of which require a STEM degree from a well-known school. Furthermore, STEM degree in US would solve most visa issues for now. I also have some interest in pursuing a PhD later on, and obviously a stats degree would help tremendously with this. UG GPA: 4.05/5.00 Grad GPA: 5.00/5.00 (expected graduation by summer) Test scores: Haven't taken yet, but should be able to score well on quant and probably pretty well in verbal/written considering I'm not a native speaker. Relevant course work: Couple of master's courses that apply statistics to finance (econometrics etc.), all 5s. Research experience: Have written a few individual paper's for B.Sc Thesis/MS courses, currently working a M.Sc thesis that requires a bit of programming as well. I am looking to get a bit of RA experience on the side before graduating as well. Letters: At least 1 strong letter from a professor (PhD from T10 school in US in '80s, couple of publications in top journals) who I has been something of a mentor for me, he should be able to talk me up enough that the rest of the LORs should be at least good. Work experience: Internship in trading derivatives, nothing research/stats related. Teaching experience: None Applying: 1 year statistics M.Sc programs in US, application round of Fall 2016. I am only interested in doing this degree in a T10 stats school - what are my chances of getting admission with my current profile?
  10. I am currently doing a study abroad semester in a well-ranked US finance program (UG). One thing I have come to notice here is that in general the studies are a lot more 'supervised', i.e. the teachers make it very clear what you need to do to achieve performance that they will consider outstanding and extra effort is very rarely expected. This differs a lot from my experiences that I've had while studying in my home University in Europe. I've read some Ph.D. students in different fields have had similar experiences when comparing US system to UK - I was wondering if this is the same in finance? I have no trouble taking responsibility of my own work, and actually feel like a less supervised working environment fosters my intelligent development better. Would this make UK better fit for me than US? Ideally, I'd also prefer to finish my Ph.D. as soon as possible (doesn't necessarily mean I want to work less mind you, when I really get into something I usually like to put in the hours and if the supervisor isn't comfortable with me working at a faster pace I'd probably grow frustrated at some point), so the UK programs would also have this advantage over US with less required course work. I'll be entering the program with 2 year M.Sc, including a couple of Ph.D. level courses, so I wouldn't mind opting for one year of courses instead of 2. If I were to choose UK instead of US, how would this affect my career prospects later on? I know in academia it is harder to get a job in a good US program with UK degree (rankings...), but is this also a hindrance if I were to choose to go into industry instead? My nr 1 motivation for getting Ph.D. is the fact that I enjoy the intellectual environment and challenges in academia, and the freedom to focus on a specific topic for a few years and become an expert in that. I know in general a lot of you are going to be opposed to me pursuing a Ph.D. without a goal of working in the academia, but many of the jobs I am interested would require either a Ph.D. or couple of years work experience and climbing the corporate ladder - I think for me personally, the former might be the more enjoyable and intellectually challenging than the latter, and doing something that is enjoyable is a lot more important for me than simply pursuing a specific goal or position.
  11. Once again, I have to thank you for taking your time to write another insightful reply! It is not that I think I need my opinions to be validated by you to be fit for grad school, and I fully recognize that in the end the decision is entirely up to me. What I do value in your posts is the fact that you are in grad school right now, you know how you think yourself, and you obviously have a good idea of what finance is like as a field of study and the kind of people who study it - hence my question of whether PhD in finance would seem like a good decision or not, i.e. if my ideas don't sound like something a typical grad student in finance has going through his head, then obviously I should strongly reconsider whether I want to make the commitment or not. You addressed all this in great detail, and that is why I am grateful for your posts! On finance being more applied - I understand, that the academic research itself might not be as applied as I implied in my post, but take market anomalies for example since you brought it up - regardless of how you explain them, you can still take your money to the markets and trade based on your findings (assuming that the inefficiencies are actually considerable enough to cover transaction costs, data is valid etc). Some firms and consulting agencies etc. use the theories behind determining cost of capital to make business decisions on very large scale projects, etc. Applied is probably not the word I was looking for here though - what I meant is that financial theory more often deals with things that you can use to turn into money in real life (although I do understand that there are many occasions where this certainly doesn't hold true), but of course this doesn't happen in the academic journals. Still, I'd like to believe that by going the academic route to acquire the necessary tool box for forming my own educated opinions of e.g. markets, I can then take that tool box and apply it in the industry if I so choose to, while still having the option to stay/come back to academia. I think the gap in Econ might be wider in this sense? Regarding the assumptions: I understand the important role these play in research and science in general - an old but clear example of this would be CAPM. It was such a nice and interesting theory that it is still thought in the "Introduction to finance" classes, even though it has been shot full of holes since it was originally published. However, exploring and relaxing some of the underlying assumptions has led to a birth of many new theories. A more recent example would be the LIBOR vs. OIS as a risk free rate when pricing derivatives. Apparently guys at Goldman Sachs made a lot of money by being among the first to figure this out. With that being said, I don't expect to go into the program and just tear through the existing field of theory and completely transform the whole field - what I do want is that intuitive understanding of the assumptions that were made to come at certain conclusions, and how those conclusions will fare when some of the assumptions are relaxed. Surely all of these ideas might not be relevant when doing academic research, but doing research, along with the course work and getting more familiar with the literature, should build that intuition which can later be put to use outside of academia (which doesn't even necessarily mean one has to leave academia to make us of it. At least in the university I go to, a lot of the finance profs do some kind of consulting gigs, are involved in asset management or run other similar businesses on the side while in academia). Can I handle not "winning" always? Absolutely. I've never been the top of class when I started, it always took a lot of work, but that's only good because improving always felt better to me than simply topping the class. I am by no means a prodigy, but because I like what I study and have the motivation to put in more work than people more talented than me, I get better results than they do. This is why I love competition - if you are a competitive person, competing against peers that are in many ways more talented than you are forces you to develop a lot faster than settling in a place where you constantly top the courses you take. This is one of the central reasons why I care about the prestige and ranking that the program has, not necessarily because I absolutely need to have a T10 school on my CV.
  12. HorsesInVA: Thanks for the excellent post! With the limited exposure I have thus far, I do like research in Finance very much. In fact, I am currently working on a research paper for one course, which could've also been completed by taking an exam which probably is a bit easier than your average grad exam - took the 'hard way' because I like doing research and feel like it is one of the best ways to actually learn some interesting subject inside and out. I like the course work too, up until the final day or so when you are cramming the material for the final time to fine tune all those details to your brain that will ensure you will finish among the top of the class - this is more of a necessary evil for me than something I actually like, I'd rather spend the same time learning something new. Sure, I'd be lying if I didn't say I don't want prestige and money - frankly speaking, I know very few young guys in finance who don't want that. Generally speaking, most finance students in the school I'm going to are also very competitive, and I am no exception to that rule, quite the opposite. With that being said, perhaps I did not communicate my interest clearly enough. I like math to the extent that it helps you organize and investigate real world phenomena - I don't believe in one single perfect model that allows you to explain everything that goes on in the markets and lets you rule the world. One of the most interesting aspects in all of finance, IMO, is how the underlying assumptions behind all these models and theories work in real life, and how their short-comings can be improved and/or exploited. This requires a solid understanding and intuition of the current literature, and possibly other related fields that might be relevant to the problem at hand. This intuitive understanding of the theory and underlying assumptions is something I find more interesting than the math itself - math is simply one rather convenient tool for achieving the solutions to these problems. I couldn't imagine continuing with any other field, except for economics, but I feel like finance has more applied touch to it, and like you pointed out, I do enjoy the competitive attitude, which is more common in finance than econ based on my (limited) experience. Does this explain my reasons better/does it sound more like PhD in Finance would be the way to go? Since I get the idea that doing 2 years of courses in 1 year is not the best idea, how do people generally go about speeding up their studies when/if they do, i.e. is it more common to get started with doing research as soon as you get in the program to get more familiar with the line of research and hopefully get some publications that you can eventually develop into a dissertation? How sympathetic the PhD advisers are to these ideas?
  13. I'm probably more interested in going industry at first, i.e. HF/banking, but definitely wouldn't mind returning to academia down the road, so I want to keep that option open as well. In all fairness though, it is impossible to say what will be going through my head in 5 years, the reason I want to do PhD is to gain a better foundation to make some sense of the complicated world in which we are living in - economics and finance has become something of a passion for me, and (based on my own thoughts, the conversations I've had with friends, family, professors etc) I believe I'd really enjoy doing a PhD. Thus my attitude is more towards doing what I love and being great at it, rather than having a specific career path in mind. I know many top programs won't let you skip courses, but I don't think it'll be much of a struggle to complete courses with similar syllabus if I have already aced them once, i.e. that'd leave me time to squeeze in extra courses right? My idea definitely isn't to rush through the dissertation and 'just get it done', but as far as I understand, the course work is supposed to lay the theoretical and empirical foundation for being able to do serious research, so after reaching the level where I can confidently pass quals wouldn't my time be better spent in working on the dissertation? Don't want to make it sound like I have one foot out the door before even getting in, but being that I'm still a young guy with no family obligations etc and finance is something that I really enjoy doing, I'd like to experience as much as it has to offer as possible. This whole idea pretty much derives from my experiences with my current studies, i.e. having listened the last two years people wondering just why exactly I'm going thought the degree at the pace I am, without them realizing that if I was forced to sit in B.Sc courses for 3 years I would probably go insane :D
  14. Those of you who have enough years in a US PhD program in Finance - do you consider it possible to complete the degree in for example 3 years? I have been checking out some of the more prestigious programs and their required course work for the first two years, and it seems to be rather heavy on economics and econometrics. Personally, I will be doing my MSc minor in Economics, and having a bunch of undergrad econ courses on my BSc already I'll be able to take at least two grad courses both in Micro and Macro. I have also kept a solid pace throughout my B.Sc/M.Sc, basically taking twice the course load without compromising my GPA (except for some compulsory bullshit courses in B.Sc completely irrelevant to econ/finance). For someone with solid background in Econ and Finance, would it be possible to get majority of the course work done during the first year of studies and start working on the dissertation already on the second year of studies? Many post-grad students here do it (I'm from Europe), but I wonder if it is a different thing in US?
  15. I still have one year left, so I'll be applying for 2017 entry. All the undergrad work is basically done, only have exchange semester (T20 US school) left. My master's is missing a few courses which I should be able to ace, and a thesis (the perfect grad GPA below thus represents the coursework I have completed, but I should be able to maintain the clean record). I am posting to a) get opinions on what I could do to still strengthen my profile, and b) assuming that I get those things done, what range of schools should I be applying to? Test Scores (GMAT/GRE): Haven't taken yet, but should be sufficiently good Undegrad GPA:4.10/5.00 Graduate GPA:5.00/5.00 Research Experience: MSc Thesis will be the only serious piece of research done independently, and I will do everything I can to make sure it will be outstanding. Should be in a strong position to get a paid RA position for summer 2016. Teaching Experience: Nothing thus far, but I think I could possibly TA for one MSc level course if this would significantly improve my profile? Work Experience: Nothing relevant to finance and research. I'll have both BSc and MSc done in a little over 3 years, which is considered rather fast for a 5 year degree (3+2). Probably won't influence the ACs decision much though. Concentration Applying to: Finance Number of programs planned to apply to: 15-20 Dream Schools: Any school in T10 would be a dream come true, would still be very happy with T20 What made you want to pursue a PhD: Great passion for finance (especially markets side, not necessarily corporate finance) - I feel like the time it takes to get MSc is not enough to learn everything I want to learn and would love the opportunity to explore the field a little more freely than regular all-nighters at some bank would allow me to. Finance and economics is what I want to be doing to rest of my life, and getting PhD while I'm still young would ensure that I have the qualifications to do whatever I want with my career and give me plenty of tools to work with, whether I choose to go into academia or industry. Concerns you have about your profile: I come from a rather small country in the northern Europe - the University I have attended is hands down the best business University here and very well respected, but I doubt its very well known in US. Any additional specific questions you may have: Like I mentioned, I'll be doing my exchange semester this fall in the states - the school I'll be attending is one where I'd happily do my PhD as well. Besides getting a LOR from a prof teaching one of the classes I'll be taking, would there be anything I could do to strengthen my chances of at least getting admitted there, besides showing my interest and making sure as many people in their faculty know me as possible?
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