I have obtained my first degree in mechanical engineering and I am applying to MSc course in financial mathematics and actuarial science. I have got offer to both courses and I need advice which course to be chosen. To me, both of them seem more or less the same and from my understanding, financial mathematics needs more sophisticated mathematics if compared to actuarial science. I have browsed through some forums and I found that different people said different things about the courses and I am really confused with their say. I would like to ask few questions here and I hope that you can shed some light on this matter.1. What is the main difference between actuaries and quants in terms of their daily job?2. Do actuaries use extensive programming skills like quants?3. Which profession will have more and broader job opportunities?4. Which one will have more balanced life(less working hours)?5. Whose prospects will be more promising and who will have more stable career?6. Do quants work in finance industry only? Can they work in insurance company? Similarly, can actuaries work in banks? If so, are actuaries and quants’s having the same role in the same institution, eg. banks?7. Which one will have better chance to climb to top management level of a company?8. Whose salary is generally higher?

most important question you should consider is will there be a job at the end of that study firms wanting quants, seem to want people with phd's in maths / physics / engineering nowadays. they also wantgood programming experience. you with an Msc in fin maths and no programming experince will way down the pecking order for quant roles. even if you tried for quant developer you will still find it tough to compete since you don't have so much programming experience. So shelling out big money on an MSc in fin maths could be risky.for actuary, there is more chance of getting job at the end of it if you do well in the exams i reckon. but, the thought of spending another 3 years studying to get fully qualified won't be much fun. dunno about you but working in life insurance or pensions sounds pretty grim to say the least.mechanical ain't so bad, you should find a job easily if your prepared to travel, and those who work abroad can earn big bucks after they build experience. on the other hand getting a phd in a mathematical mechanical area, then, get a job in mechanical gain, some experience, learn to program, you could always then try for quant type jobs later in your career.

From a perspective of an actuary...1. What is the main difference between actuaries and quants in terms of their daily job? Actuaries work for insurance companies. Quants work for banks. Insurance companies make money by offering protection to consumers and tend to be more risk adverse in nature. They deal longer term risks and ask questions like if they have sufficient money to pay out an annuity payment in 50 years time.Banks make money by looking like they make money for clients. Tend to be more short term in nature and ask questions like how they can make money today and perhaps if they could survive in a year’s time.2. Do actuaries use extensive programming skills like quants?Most actuaries deal with spreadsheets and actuarial software such as Prophet and MoSes. They may do some programming with VBA to speed up spreadsheets but by no means any real programming. Programming in Prophet/MoSes term means whether you can set up a string of variables in a coherent manner. The more IT oriented actuaries may work on programming behind the scene in the actuarial software systems.From what I can gather, quants tend to programme in C++ and other languages.3. Which profession will have more and broader job opportunities?Depends on what you mean by broad...4. Which one will have more balanced life(less working hours)?I know actuaries working crazy hours and ones who go home at 5... depends on the job.5. Whose prospects will be more promising and who will have more stable career?Actuaries probably have the edge on stability at the moment... 6. Do quants work in finance industry only? Can they work in insurance company? Similarly, can actuaries work in banks? If so, are actuaries and quants’s having the same role in the same institution, eg. banks?I’ve heard of actuaries working in banks, but not so much the other way around. (maybe there are more actuaries aspiring to be quants than the other way around..)7. Which one will have better chance to climb to top management level of a company?It’s probably a function of the person rather than qualification..8. Whose salary is generally higher?Check the job ads...One thing you may want to consider is the amount of maths you want to do on the job. In terms of day to day work, a lot of maths you do the actuarial world is 99% discounting cashflows and maybe 1% probability. The two MSc courses you are considering are very different in nature. MSc Actuarial Science gives you exemptions to the preliminary actuarial exams and deals with more basic statistic, probability, economic concepts. The MSc Financial Maths course is more mathematically demanding in nature and at one point used to give you exemption in one of the later actuarial exams. A lot of the concepts taught in FM are being used in the actuarial world...

QuoteOriginally posted by: sheepskiFrom a perspective of an actuary...A lot of the concepts taught in FM are being used in the actuarial world...Does that mean actuaries are experts in mathematics as well? Do they use Black–Scholes models or Monte Carlo methods in their works?Can actuaries switch their role to quants at a later stage of their career and how high is the "succesful rate"? I believe it is easier for quants to become actuary but I'm not sure about it since they don't sit for the actuaries profesional exams.

QuoteOriginally posted by: cklowDoes that mean actuaries are experts in mathematics as well? Do they use Black–Scholes models or Monte Carlo methods in their works?Can actuaries switch their role to quants at a later stage of their career and how high is the "succesful rate"? I believe it is easier for quants to become actuary but I'm not sure about it since they don't sit for the actuaries profesional exams.Not necessarily. Black Scholes models, Monte Carlo methods are only a subset of the overall quant picture.In theory, it is possible to switch between any profession you want. The question comes down to time/effort/money.Say you've been working as an actuarial student for 3 years and you wanted to switch to be a quant. You lose the 3 years you have invested in your actuarial studies and career progression plus you have to study again and get a job at a junior level. The prevailing quant job market also factors into the equation.Same going the other way. Not something most people would take lightly.

being an actuary myself, i can not see a good reason why to become an actuary apart from mediocrity.if you like math, you may try your luck in the academic world. although the actuarial studies contain a lot of interesting math, it is not used in practice. i learned the math that i use for my work when i was 10yrs old.if you like programming, become a programmer. excel and VBA (but not extensiveley) is all you need to do the job.if you like the insurance business, you should do some business oriented work. if you like to apply math to real world problems in finance you should become a quant.being at most mediocre in all of the above and having still a high paycheque, you should become an actuary.

Thanks for all of of the replies! They have really given me some info about actuaries and quants. Currently, I have got offers for MSc in financial mathematics (1 year) for University of York, UK and also PDip in Actuarial Science (1 year) from University of Kent, UK.The best part about the PDip is I will get 9 papers exemption (CT1 to CT9) from The Actuarial Profession, UK upon completion of the course with good score. After that, I can apply to the same university for MSc in Actuarial Science (1 year as well). This MSc can give exemption from CA1 and CA3 of the Core Applications subjects and ST2 to ST6 of the Specialist Technical subjects of the examinations set by the UK Actuarial Profession. Students on this programme can also choose an optional Modelling module which prepares them for subject CA2. After that, I will work for 2 years and sit for one more paper (I'm not very sure with the paper name) and I can become an actuary ( Associate or Fellow, I'm not clear), I suppose.On the other hand, I was thinking that if I get an offer from Oxford or Imperial college, then maybe I will do financial maths because the universities are "branded" universities. I will then change my MSc offer for University of York to Conversion Year program to revise and master the prerequisite maths subjects for the course first because I am not really confident with my maths basics. At the same time, I will defer my offer from the branded university to a year later so that I can join the MSc course after I complete my conversion year program in York. Do you really think it is a good idea? But of course, this is provided I can get an offer from the branded universities!My another concern is that most of the quants are with phD and it might be difficult for me to compete with them for the job since I only have an MSc! Some people told me quants work crazy hours and some said actuaries work crazy hours. Which one is true?I am learning C++ now and is this language useful to my future career as an actuary? I know it is a "must" for a quants! Thanks again.

There are also some actuaries who do a lot of probability and math - most work in general insurance, the areas of life and pension are well...depressingly dull (except for varable annuity hedging which is distinctly quant like in nature).If you want to be a proper quant, rather than a quant developer, you need the phd (from what I've heard). C++ won't benefit you as an actuary (most actuaries don't program, if there's a need for programming, then actuaries will spec it out and employ a programming to implement it).Apparently actuaries may have a good future in risk management for the banking sector, who knows if that's true, but I don't think they could do a worse job than the back office quants did (did quants really use correlated normal distributions for risk management models...surely not!) Btw, getting all those exemptions from uni (with the diploma + msc) will make it tough to find you first job - employers hate the 99% qualified via exemptions but with 1% experience type of candidates, but once you get through the door you will be fine (and your collegues from maths backgrounds will hate you for a bit...). Once you are qualified, that won't matter though.

QuoteOriginally posted by: tibbar(and your collegues from maths backgrounds will hate you for a bit...).q]Why? Any reason for that?

As you will arrive with all the exemptions whilst most other people have to study 20 hours a week in their spare time for the next 3-5 years...

With my qualification (Bachelor in mechanical engineering), which offer do you think I should take?

In the current climate, I think the actuarial course is the safe bet - the actuarial industry is unaffected by the credit crisis, so there's plenty of jobs about. Don't be discouraged by my comments about exemptions - the exams are torturous and unenjoyable, most are bullish about them in the first year or two, but soon realise there's no easy route through them. Get as many exemptions as possible if you value your social life!My personal experience is in the actuarial profession (since 2000), I've always been quite frustrated that I didn't go into a banking career (as I find traditional actuarial work not technical enough). However, over the years I discovered that you can find interesting and technical roles as an actuary, but they are rare and not typical of this career path.General insurance or investment consulting are the best bets for an interesting career - avoid life and pensions (especially pensions as that field is dying out as defined benefit pensions are disappeating).