2024 Q1 Market Report
So far 2024 is more about what’s not happening than what is happening. What’s not happening is any significant change from the 2nd half of 2023. The cyclical hiring we expected with the start of the new year has not materialized. Banks hiring remains largely frozen. This phenomenon extends to contract hiring as well as fulltime. The only openings we’ve seen are a smattering of contract roles that were funded due to regulatory requirements.
While some hedge funds and FinTechs continue to hire, the number of openings is relatively low. The lack of bank hiring has taken a lot of hiring capacity out of the system. I talk to quite a few people these days who have been looking for a long time – it’s a very tough market for many.
With the overall job market so strong, why is our niche struggling? I think it’s clear that the post covid hiring boom caused a bubble that we’re still working through. Demand is low:
Little bank hiring
Tech is hiring, but it’s ”relatively minimal”
Startup funding way down (see chart below)
Hedge funds have been successful filling their positions (little competition)
Add to these points the bubble hangover - people are staying put, because it’s hard to match or exceed current compensation.
Software Engineer Salaries Down
I never thought I’d see SE salaries trend down. The Levels.fyi End of Year Pay Report 2023 shows just that, however. Re the “bubble”, note the average pay for Software Engineers went down in 2023 from 2022, though back up the 2nd half of 2023 vs the first half. 3rd quartile and max salaries did go up for the period, reflecting that demand for the very best people continues to be high, and there is intense competition for those individuals.
Note: Our audience has a significantly higher average compensation and commensurate volatility. I have no statistics but I’m sure our audience has seen significantly larger compensation decreases and has yet to see a recovery.
HackerRank observed in their HR Skills Report, “While the first half of 2023 was lackluster, with lower hiring activity, the second half showed signs of stabilization and positive traction - From July 2023 forward, developer test invites and new test creations, both barometers of hiring activity, increased 86% and 58% respectively.”
Bye Bye Hybrid
Top Paying Companies
I like this list from Levels.fyi, since it matches what we observe (many such lists don’t). Note that below reflects the median across all levels. OpenAI is clearly paying extraordinary salaries for the top AI talent in the world. I had never heard of Coupang before looking at this list…
Current Priorities
Last quarter I wrote, “I expect this list to change dramatically over the next 6 weeks!” It has not.
SE: Software Engineer
QD: Quantitative Developer
QR: Quantitative Researcher
HF: Hedge Fund
Buy Side
Most in Demand: C++, Python, QD, Prior industry experience, especially Buy-side experience
A few different roles:
Systematic Trader – track record required – multiple clients
Chief of Staff – large HF
Quantitative Product Manager – Quant to lead product design – large HF
The usual:
SE - Senior Python – Miami
SE - C++ – fixed income analytics – large HF
QR - Emerging Markets – Dallas
QD – Python - Equities quantitative framework developer – startup HF
QD – Python, some C++ - model implementation – large HF
QR – ML PhD – medium frequency - large HF
QR – Alpha researcher - medium frequency – large HF
QR - low-latency – large HF
QR – Senior Futures/FX - low-latency – large HF
SE – Java – post-trade – large HF
SE – C++ - fixed income – large HF
SE – C++ - Risk – large HF
SE – C++ - Infrastructure engineer – large HF
SE – C++ - Research platform engineer – large HF
SE – C++ - new build - high frequency/low latency – systematic HF
SE – C++/Python – embedded (w/ researchers) engineer – large HF
QD/QR – C++ - fixed income pricing libraries – large HF
SRE – fixed income – Risk – large HF
QD – Python – systematic HF
QD – C++ - systematic HF
QD/SE – Python – Risk, Portfolio Construction – Large HF
SE – Java – Enterprise Data Engineering – Large HF
SRE – Electronic Trading Engineering (ETE) – Large HF
Trade Support – ETE – Large HF
SE – Java/C++ - ETE – Large HF
QD – Algo Developer – Execution – ETE – Large HF
SE – C++ - OTC ETE – Large HF
SE – Java – Key Initiatives – Large HF
Sell Side
Most in Demand: Not much
QR – Recent PhD - Treasury Strats – Resource allocation – leading IB
FinTech
Senior Scala engineer - Fixed Income, eTrading - Remote