I was recently accepted to Ecole Polytechnique's first year masters program in Applied Mathematics. For the next year, I want to complete the El Karoui's Probability and Finance master program. Is this program still considered good for working in UK? Also, I am not going to study the traditional engineering curriculum in Ecole Polytechnique, so will this create problems when finding job in France or in UK? Because I heard that if you did not study in Ecole Polytechnique after the 2 years "prepas" then this master degree is worthless, it only serves for the students of Ecole Polytechnique. Also can you compare this program to the ETH financial math program?

This master is mainly oriented for Polytechnicien but if you have a good level in math then you will do it. It's not a question of worthless it's a question of difficulty. It is very math oriented and the only who survive are X, Normaliens or at least people with a high level in maths (should I say in stochastic calculus). It's not a problem if you aren't a X, the master is enough to have a quant position in Paris or London (most of people of this master go to London after the completion). The master but itself is enough but keep in mind that if you didn't make the X path it will be very hard to follow (so prepare yourself before if it's the degree you want).

Well, I agree the level of math is pretty high...however if you have done a decent amount of math you should be fine. I believe the Master is ok if you are really interested in a pure quant job...I don't see many people going into trading or structuring though. I mean don't expect that you will see much finance.

I would say "Don't expect to see finance at all". It's mainly stochastic calculus and programming. But I fear that a lot of MFEs are like that. Anyway if you want a good quant job in Paris or London this is a must.

Here's a very good endorsement, published in the WSJ just before the crisis: A resume with her name on it "is a shortcut because you don?t need to train the person on the basics of derivatives," says Rachid Bouzouba, a former student who is now head of European equity trading at the London office of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.One thing that is very clear from this Forum is that too few people know anything about the basics of derivatives, but they know (sort of) plenty of stochastic calculus. And those two are far from being the same.P

QuoteOriginally posted by: PaulHere's a very good endorsement, published in the WSJ just before the crisis: A resume with her name on it "is a shortcut because you don?t need to train the person on the basics of derivatives," says Rachid Bouzouba, a former student who is now head of European equity trading at the London office of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.who's Leman and his brothers?

I know Nicole El Karoui and some people of her team as Nizar Touzi and Peter Tankov. They are cutting edge mathematicians in stochastic calculus and impressive researchers in applied mathematics for finance but I think that they lack of real trading experience. For me a perfect programm would be an addition of impressive math academic researcher+ senior experienced option traders+professional quants from IBs+expert in IT training (both programming and numerics which is not the same thing). At the moment I have never seen an MFE which regroups all these people and that's a bit sad.

QuoteOriginally posted by: quantmeh who's Leman and his brothers? You just 'killed the joke,' as they say!p

FWIW. a podcast of French national radio France Inter feature N.El Karoui


Nicole El Karoui, mathématicienne

The journalist is an idiot, it's not possible to listen to her.

She's not an idiot. She's just a young attractive female professional, whom old sexists like you cannot stand