Agree 100%. First firm where I worked the programmers were treated like monkeys, and the traders, some of whom weren't even that bright at the time, were almost godlike.
Some other person wrote on here about traders being angry assholes. That firm had a ton of angry asshole traders because they'd push and push and push on deadlines, didn't understand the system at all, got hacked up buggy code, never invested in unit or system tests. It was an absolute disaster.
Little anecdote: First year I was out with a more senior trader on my team over drinks. He was talking about the glory days of 08 where every single trader earned a million dollar bonus or more. I asked about the one infrastructure developer who came up with a system to use multicast to simultaneously publish our EuroStoxx signal to DAX along with a dozen other instruments. Nothing earth shattering in 2017, but it quadrupled our P&L and market share at the time.
I work in prop trading and I've never seen that kind of guaranteed salary offered. Maybe as a one time signing bonus to poach someone from a competitor. Typical base salaries for traders/quants/engineers are in the low six figures.
I'm head of a small team running high frequency strategies. I control parameters/portfolio/risk, design/fit predictive models, code C++ for simulation and live trading, and spec out designs for our FPGA developers. I make around 200 base with average bonus in the high 6 figures, good years over a million. At firms with uncapped contractural payouts, bonuses can be far higher for very profitable traders.
But if you come into the industry expecting that, prepare for disappointment. The markets are super efficient so it's hard to make profits. A lot of good ideas are done to death already. You might be stuck on a bad team or not get the opportunity to advance. Making mid 6 figures all-in on a consistently profitable team at a profitable diversified firm is a very good outcome. Modal outcome is making low 6 figures for a couple years and being pushed out.
Also while some enlightened firms realize that infrastructure is a competitive edge and pay big bonuses to engineers, there are many where they're second-class citizens. Only take front-office roles at such firms, not just because of the money, but because you won't be respected. IMO they should be avoided entirely because they'll eventually fall behind and lose.
A friend works at Virtu and 60 hour weeks are the norm if not more. They're very aggressive wrt managing headcount. Pay is great in absolute terms but pretty low as a % of revenue.
Doesn't mean it's a bad place to work. I have a ton of respect for the business they've built. Their discipline on costs is saving their asses in historically slow market conditions while many competitors are merging or shutting down.
Some other person wrote on here about traders being angry assholes. That firm had a ton of angry asshole traders because they'd push and push and push on deadlines, didn't understand the system at all, got hacked up buggy code, never invested in unit or system tests. It was an absolute disaster.
Little anecdote: First year I was out with a more senior trader on my team over drinks. He was talking about the glory days of 08 where every single trader earned a million dollar bonus or more. I asked about the one infrastructure developer who came up with a system to use multicast to simultaneously publish our EuroStoxx signal to DAX along with a dozen other instruments. Nothing earth shattering in 2017, but it quadrupled our P&L and market share at the time.
He got 10 grand.