This is your pay as a quant in a bank versus a hedge fund

9 August 2021

2 minute read

This is your pay as a quant in a bank versus a hedge fund

If you work as a quant and you want to make really big money, the best place to do it is - predictably enough - America. And predictably enough again, the best place to make the massive money in North America is a major hedge fund.

The latest quant salary survey from global recruitment firm Selby Jennings doesn't say exactly how much the most senior quants are making at major funds, but given that quant traders can get up to 50% of their P&L as a bonus and that they might be managing $50m+ of funds which could rise in value by 5% a year, $1.25m is highly likely, and many are probably making a lot more.

The tables below show Selby Jennings' figures for quant pay globally, in North America, Europe the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and the Asia Pacific region. All figures are given in U.S. dollars, except for EMEA which are provided in British pounds. Salaries are slightly higher than the norm in EMEA, but bonuses are generally lower as a result.

The survey highlights how much you can earn as a PhD level quant these days, and makes some of the new salaries for investment bankers and traders look paltry by comparison.

Asian salaries are typically a lot lower than elsewhere, although this may change as major hedge funds build out their presence in Asia. Selby Jennings notes that multinational hedge funds are increasingly seeing Singapore and Hong Kong as a good hubs for quant talent due to the presence of major technical universities in nearby cities.