Quant careers · MBA admissions · Oxbridge STEM
Academic Quant
Academic Quant helps people get into quantitative finance, top MBA programmes and Oxford and Cambridge STEM courses. It's run by a working high-frequency trading quant with an Oxford MSc in computer science, an LBS MBA and a master's in financial engineering.
The practice questions and courses are free to use. The reports cover how firms and schools actually decide, and the strategy hour is one call on your own case.
Open to everyone, no account needed: practice questions with worked solutions and timed tests, and courses on coding interviews, machine learning from scratch and low-latency C++.
Book a 20-minute call See the work
- Oxford MSc Computer Science
- LBS MBA, quantitative finance
- HFT quant, full time
- LBS admissions interviewer
Three kinds of work: quant careers, MBA admissions, Oxbridge STEM
For each, a one-hour strategy call with your record read beforehand, a report on how the firms, schools and universities decide, and practice questions with worked solutions for the preparation itself.
Quantitative finance careers
Interview preparation for research, trading and development roles. MFE and MFin admissions.
Jane Street · Citadel · Optiver · IMC Quant interview preparation →MBA admissions
M7, London Business School and INSEAD, for applicants out of finance and engineering.
M7 · LBS · INSEAD MBA admissions consulting →Oxbridge & US STEM
TMUA, STEP and ESAT, the odds by course, and what the interviews test.
Oxford · Cambridge · MIT MAT, STEP & Oxbridge interviews →Reports
PDF · Edition 2 · £79
The Quant Careers Report
What Jane Street, Citadel, Optiver and ten other firms test at each stage, what they pay and when their classes fill. Then the methods behind every question type, taught through 345 problems written for the report, each solved step by step.
PDF · Edition 2 · £79
The MBA Admissions Report
How Harvard, Stanford, Wharton, LBS, INSEAD and thirteen more decide: who gets in, what it costs and pays, essays and interviews seen from the interviewer's chair, and a full GMAT, GRE and EA course with 188 problems.
PDF · Edition 2 · £79
The STEM Admissions Report
Oxford, Cambridge and the leading US universities, course by course: real offer rates, what each admissions test rewards, interviews worked through from the tutor's side, and TMUA, MAT and STEP problems with full solutions.
Worked solutions · Timed tests
Practice
1040 questions with worked solutions for quant interviews, the GMAT, the GRE and Oxbridge maths admissions, with timed tests at real exam pace.
Admissions consulting and quant careers advisory
- MBA — London Business School, specialising in quantitative finance. MBA and EMBA admissions interviewer for the school.
- MSc Computer Science — University of Oxford
- MSc Financial Engineering
- High-frequency trading quant — full time; previously quantitative developer and quantitative researcher
- GMAT 99th percentile — achieved twice
- GRE 99th percentile — verbal and quantitative
- 15+ years teaching
- Published research — algebraic topology, category theory, stochastic calculus and theoretical computer science; order book modelling and high-frequency trading
I sit on the other side of the table. I interview MBA and Executive MBA applicants for London Business School and run alumni interviews, which means the advice I give on how a candidate comes across is not inference. It is what I watch happen, every cycle, in the room where it is decided.
Most candidates buy this in pieces: an admissions consultant for the application, a tutor for the mathematics, a coach for the interview. Here it is one person, who does all three. Why work with me, and how it compares →
Method
- Conversation Twenty minutes, no charge, booked online. A conversation about where you are and what you want, with nothing to prepare.
- Strategy hour A one-hour strategy call, £250. I read your CV, transcript and scores beforehand; the hour covers where you stand, your realistic odds at each target and your deadlines.
- The preparation The reports for what each target asks for, and the practice banks for every question with its worked solution, the timed tests and Ask AI.
- Outcome Through to the offer or the admission, with an honest view of the odds from the start.
Remote, across time zones
Everything is remote and always has been. Working on Central European Time, mornings suit Singapore, Hong Kong, Seoul and Tokyo. Afternoons suit the Gulf and Europe. Evenings suit the United States.
Where clients are headed
The universities and firms these programmes are built around. Admissions tests, essays and interviews differ enough between them that the preparation is not interchangeable.
Universities
Business schools
Firms clients target
From the blog
Longer and more technical than is fashionable, because the useful part is usually in the detail. Subscribe and you get one problem a week with a full worked solution.
What a quant interview is actually testing
The mathematics is the entry ticket. What decides the outcome is the ninety seconds after you realise you have no answer.
Read the quant interview piece → CReading a MAT question the way an examiner does
Why students with perfect school marks score in the forties on MAT mocks, and why their training works against them.
Read the Oxford admissions piece → BHow to score in the 99th percentile on the GMAT
715 and above is the top 1% on the GMAT Focus Edition. The method, from someone who has scored there twice.
Read the GMAT piece → BWhy I chose London Business School
Why a quant chose LBS, what it costs, and what I look for as an LBS interviewer.
Read the LBS piece →Book
Book a twenty-minute call and tell me what you are trying to do.
About Academic Quant
What is Academic Quant?
Academic Quant is an independent site and advisory for quant finance careers, MBA admissions and Oxford and Cambridge STEM entry. It publishes free practice questions, coding courses and sourced guides, sells three reports, and offers a one-hour strategy call.
Who runs Academic Quant?
A working high-frequency trading quant with an Oxford MSc in computer science, an LBS MBA specialising in quantitative finance and a master's in financial engineering, who also interviews MBA and Executive MBA applicants for London Business School.
Does Academic Quant offer quant interview coaching?
Yes. Start with a free 20-minute call. The strategy hour is then a one-hour online call at £250 for quant trading, research and developer candidates, available worldwide. Your CV and targets are read beforehand. Free practice comes with it: 500 quant questions with worked answers, timed papers and mental maths tests.
What does Academic Quant cost?
The first 20-minute call is free, and so are the practice questions and courses at the moment. The reports are £79 each and the strategy hour is £250.