Citi quant - Thoughts?

Fierytycoon · Post by **Fierytycoon** » Sun Mar 02, 2008 9:26 pm

What do you all think about Citi's quant divisions? General thoughts/comments would be great, but internship-specific remarks would be fantastic as well. Thanks.

granchio · Post by **granchio** » Mon Mar 03, 2008 1:20 pm

which of the many?

Fierytycoon · Post by **Fierytycoon** » Mon Mar 03, 2008 3:58 pm

I didn't really have a particular one in mind (intern placement is determined by Citi anyways, and the analyst program is rotational), so any general comments would be great. For example, I have seen many people on this board comment on the prestige of Goldman's quant teams compared to those at other IBs, so perhaps some insight on how Citi compares to those?

granchio · Post by **granchio** » Mon Mar 03, 2008 9:18 pm

too general to comment. quant is too wide: goes from equity research to prop strategies to exotic derivative pricing... completely different stuff

Fierytycoon · Post by **Fierytycoon** » Wed Mar 05, 2008 7:45 pm

Well, given my position, I'm not really able to ask any more specific questions. Which of Citi's quant divisions/desks do you think are the best/strongest?

doobs · Post by **doobs** » Wed Mar 05, 2008 7:52 pm

I remember a couple of yrs back when I had a field trip to the quant shop there, the head of IR Deriv research saying he really liked Citi more than other shops, because it was more like academia than wall st..

aaron · Post by **aaron** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 10:52 pm

There are some top quants at Citi, but in the past it has been overstaffed with overlapping departments and plagued by poor communication. If they have, say, three of the top hundred credit derivative quants in the world (I just made that up, but it's possible) they're probably working in different departments and never speak to each other. And they probably don't have frequent brainstorming sessions with Citi's top quants in other areas.

The problem with that is you don't get the kind of exposure to world-class thinking as you would at a Goldman or other top shop. You have to be lucky to be working with a top person at Citi, and even if you're lucky you'll probably be exposed to only one. Citi is a huge, unintegrated place.

The plus side is people are more likely to leave you alone at Citi. Usually that's bad, especially early in your career, but sometimes it can work to your advantage. Also, while Citi may not be as good an opportunity as Goldman in general, in some departments or situations it can be great, and it beats not having an internship at a top place at all.

Vikrim Pandit is likely to change this, but probably not quickly nor completely.

correlator · Post by **correlator** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 9:22 pm

Apart from generalisations below; useful to keep in mind that in rates, Citi was arguably the first to implement Markov Functional Models across the board.

Related to this:

Read Financial Derivatives in Theory and Practice if you want to work there. If you want to figure out why, ask around when you are there.

quantie · Post by **quantie** » Thu Mar 20, 2008 2:13 am

I can only say this Citi has some of the best quants in the street period. Aaron as usual summarizes some of the issues around overlap well.

But if you are going to be in the hybrid analyst program(?) you will rotate and see many desks so on average you will be better off at citi than most other banks on the street.