UCL Financial Computing

[cluedec]

I've just graduated from the MSc Computational Finance in UCL. Feel free to ask me specific questions.

I have a question. What is your educational background? I have a BSc in Computer Science (from UCL) and an MSc in Computation and I am thinking of doing this course starting in 2018. I've been programming at IB's (debt - mainly non-FO) for quite a while now so have an informal-ish understanding of the products, pricing, risk, trading functions/roles, markets, structures/strategies, jargon, actors and popular trading systems and pretty good c++/java/db/etc skills.

If you came from a more technical rather than financial/mathematical background did you find the mathematical content of the course particularly difficult/taxing? Similarly along these lines, was it easy to get help/advice or extra instruction when (if) you found the going difficult.

I would rather do an MFE degree but I don't think I have enough maths in my first degree to be accepted. Oxford has a Computational Finance MSc but they have more stringent 1st degree mathematical requirements.

Thanks.

 

[F.Fontana]

I have a question. What is your educational background? I have a BSc in Computer Science (from UCL) and an MSc in Computation and I am thinking of doing this course starting in 2018. I've been programming at IB's (debt - mainly non-FO) for quite a while now so have an informal-ish understanding of the products, pricing, risk, trading functions/roles, markets, structures/strategies, jargon, actors and popular trading systems and pretty good c++/java/db/etc skills.

If you came from a more technical rather than financial/mathematical background did you find the mathematical content of the course particularly difficult/taxing? Similarly along these lines, was it easy to get help/advice or extra instruction when (if) you found the going difficult.

I would rather do an MFE degree but I don't think I have enough maths in my first degree to be accepted. Oxford has a Computational Finance MSc but they have more stringent 1st degree mathematical requirements.

Thanks.

This course has 4 out of 8 elective classes. If you know what you want and you are honest with yourself, you have the fantastic opportunity to tailor your master according to your preferences. You will study hard and learn the topics that you like. If you are dishonest with yourself, you will take easier electives covering topics with whom you are already familiar with. Put in other words, you should not be worried about the difficulty of this MSc since you have a lot of freedom to calibrate the content. Your background seems to be appropriate for this master.

 

[cluedec]

This course has 4 out of 8 elective classes. If you know what you want and you are honest with yourself, you have the fantastic opportunity to tailor your master according to your preferences. You will study hard and learn the topics that you like. If you are dishonest with yourself, you will take easier electives covering topics with whom you are already familiar with. Put in other words, you should not be worried about the difficulty of this MSc since you have a lot of freedom to calibrate the content. Your background seems to be appropriate for this master.

Hello. Thanks for your feedback.
Cheers

 

[Wessel]

I've just graduated from the MSc Computational Finance in UCL. Feel free to ask me specific questions.

Quick review - Since half of the program is composed by elective courses, you can really tailor the structure of the program according to your preferences. This is wonderful if you know what you want. The department offers many courses in machine learning, thus if you want to study both machine learning and quant finance, this place may be very suitable to you. The career service placed me in one of the top investment banks doing applied machine learning and I'm still there.

P.S.: I've had colleagues coming from the aforementioned Financial System Engineering and some are still there as well.

Hi Fontana!

I've got a bunch of questions for you but I'l try to keep it short.

Last year I studied the MSc Drug Discovery and Pharma Management at UCL SoP. I was not at all pleased with this study and honestly I and a lot of my fellow students were shocked about the overall quality and the level of the degree. In short, imo I've wasted a lot of money and an entire year.

Now I've got an offer from UCL to study the MSc Computational Finance but I am very worried that it's going to be a repeat of last year: lots and lots of students with zero experience, useless classes, useless exams, all in all again a waste of money and time. Sorry for my negativity...

I've looked at the programme's structure of CF and it looks awesome but I have no clue whether the quality of the course is any good.

So basically, can you tell me a bit about the course? The quality, the students, etc. Do you think you've learned a lot and are you ready to work at a top company? Also, do you guys do a lot of programming?

I would love to hear from you!

Thanks,

Wessel

 

[F.Fontana]

Hi @Wessel. I do not have much to add to the previous comments. Overall, the program has exceeded my expectations and I ended up doing the job that I wanted. As I said, do avoid the wrong classes (i.e. the easy ones where you don't learn much just for the sake of getting a high grade). You'll have the possibility to attend the first 2+ lectures before deciding to select the class as elective or not. Make sure to network with the people in the career service so they will know and trust you (there are several opportunities) but remember that the best internships will be most likely assigned to the students with the highest grades.

TL;DR: If you are willing to work very hard, it very well worths the time and money in my opinion. A student that is unlucky or has bad grades will not be spoon fed.

 

[Philip_Mitterrand]

This is the basic truth for most UK based programs including Quant programs except Oxford/Cambridge maybe. It's same elementary crap electives, filled with 3rd rate Asian students and no career opportunities. Remember even the best Asian students avoid UK Unis. Teachers doesn't have more than 5h index score. I don't know much about UCL Computing but shall err on the side of hope but again that can be an expensive proposition.

Hi Fontana!

I've got a bunch of questions for you but I'l try to keep it short.

Last year I studied the MSc Drug Discovery and Pharma Management at UCL SoP. I was not at all pleased with this study and honestly I and a lot of my fellow students were shocked about the overall quality and the level of the degree. In short, imo I've wasted a lot of money and an entire year.

Now I've got an offer from UCL to study the MSc Computational Finance but I am very worried that it's going to be a repeat of last year: lots and lots of students with zero experience, useless classes, useless exams, all in all again a waste of money and time. Sorry for my negativity...

I've looked at the programme's structure of CF and it looks awesome but I have no clue whether the quality of the course is any good.

So basically, can you tell me a bit about the course? The quality, the students, etc. Do you think you've learned a lot and are you ready to work at a top company? Also, do you guys do a lot of programming?

I would love to hear from you!

Thanks,

Wessel

 

[Mathchismo]

Some thoughts on these courses, seeing my involvement in similar endeavours since 1990..

I had a look at this course. In my opinion it is what you should learn 1) after 10 years of hard-core programming experience or 2) on the job (learning Tools for later).

You learn all this stuff doing, on the job.

I would learn hard maths, data structures, C++, parallel processing, etc.

Another example is the set of courses
http://www-typo3.cs.ucl.ac.uk/students/syllabus/mscsse/gs02_advanced_analysis_and_design/

It is good to do these; I have intimate knowledge of all these IT (i.e.they are not QF-specific) topics (OOA/OOD since 1991). Software has moved on a bit since the heyday of UML and GOF, the world is not OOP alone but is multi-paradigm.. And quant s/w has a different focus; it is more focused on algos rather than on software design. UML is no longer a hot topic. You cannot become a good designer/architect until you have become a good developer.

Actually, OOP is not the most useful model as such for quant software...there is a mismatch, but OOP does play a role.

Last, how to link up OOP and QF???

I tend to agree with Dominic's viewpoint. He has real experience and knows what skills are needed.

Daniel or anyone (no trolls please) - thoughts on this PhD specifically vs doing the Harvard CSE or MIT MFin?

Ideal thesis topic: AI (Deep learning, Re-enforcement learning) for financial prediction. During the MRes load up on Computational Stats/Machine Learning units at UCL and financial math units at Imperial.

If I get full scholarship this could end up cheaper for me in starting in Sept 2018/2019 vs Harvard CSE or MIT MFin. Main downside is no access to the NYC banks/hedge funds.

But again getting full scholarship is a big if.