Send us a text When working at a start-up everyone comes out of the woodwork to tell you how to run your business. It is very challenging to figure out good and bad advice especially when you end up in really unique situations. There is no quick Google search for the right answer or there are a million opinions and no clear answer. Over the years of my career in manufacturing and in banking I've come to the conclusion that most consultants aren't worth much and their charge way more than they ad...
May 04, 2021•13 min•Season 3Ep. 7
Send us a text The challenges of management are no joke, and no an MBA won't cut it! Getting real world experience especially at a small firm will allow you to really see how people think and behave. You can't be the fun laid back manager and you can't be so strict that everyone undermines you behind your back. Setting a strict system of how you operate while being reasonable and understanding will go a long way. Balancing these two halves is very challenging though and often at large firms you ...
Apr 27, 2021•25 min•Season 3Ep. 6
Send us a text Precast concrete is a dead industry due to inefficiencies, a lack of understanding on how to set up operations and manufacturing, and there has been minimal innovation in decades. The industry needs to be revitalized. It needs fresh blood from those who are experts in manufacturing. Learning to optimize the process will make the job more enjoyable for employees and more profitable for companies. For precast concrete to attract good talent, they need to change their culture as well...
Apr 20, 2021•28 min•Season 3Ep. 5
Send us a text The startup struggles range from the expected such as not being able to pay bills to lawsuits from investors and competitors. One thing that business school does a terrible job at is describing what it is really like to be an entrepreneur. You can have the worlds best finance guy lay out budgets, the best CEO lay out the business plan, and the best employees on staff helping however at the end of the day almost none of your plan will go as expected and you will be forced to adapt ...
Apr 13, 2021•24 min•Season 3Ep. 4
Send us a text Marketing at a startup. As a startup company we didn't have resources to hire anyone to do the marketing. I got involved by building a website to start and the later on we did some print marketing. Understanding your customer base is the most important part. Flashy marketing works for specific demographics however we sold to government agencies. The web browsers were super dated and the majority of customers were older. Creating user friendly web pages and marketing materials is v...
Apr 06, 2021•20 min•Season 3Ep. 3
Send us a text Today's episode is all about the pricing and bidding system used in the precast concrete restroom industry. Since I come from a quantitative finance background I also cover open vs closed auctions where I briefly discuss the stock exchange in comparison to dark pools. The precast concrete restroom industry is closest to dark pools however there are only bids placed with no ask. You end up with one customer requesting bids based on product and project specifications. Most small man...
Mar 30, 2021•30 min•Season 3Ep. 2
Send us a text Who is the King of Crap and how did it all start? In the first episode of Season 3: Down to Business I talk about getting into the precast concrete restroom industry. I discuss who the real king of the industry is and how they shaped me. This will give you a good understanding of the industry before I dive into more specific topics on management, the joys of a startup, the failure of working at a startup, marketing, and a few other business topics. The YouTube version: https://you...
Mar 23, 2021•19 min•Season 3Ep. 1
Send us a text Machine learning, deep learning, and AI aren't as new to finance as many people think. I have a great conversation with Agus about his career and journey into quant finance. He provides some great insight on career advice as well as some of the issues he sees with using machine learning especially in finance. Some of the important takeaways from this conversation are: - Be nice to everyone you meet. - ML is a localized method. - Technical skills such as statistics can be applied t...
Mar 16, 2021•55 min
Send us a text I interview Ali Masoumnia all about running a successful quantitative finance club at a university, how to approach professionals, the advantages of target schools, and are standards important in quant finance as well as life. Video Version: https://youtu.be/S09aiwz3dbY Ali's currently reading: The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (my affiliate link) https://amzn.to/3pyeIxY Support the show...
Feb 17, 2021•49 min
Send us a text I sit down with Morgan Maxey to discuss a variety of topics from his background of becoming a lawyer to social programs and the broken legal system. The theme that seemed to come up over and over was person agency and personal awareness. The US was built to be a system that favored the individual over the group. And part of that American structure was meant to allow individuals the freedom to pursue happiness which means both success and failure. Learning to own one's decisions wi...
Feb 02, 2021•1 hr 14 min
Send us a text I am excited to have Daniel Lackland from Ai4 come and chat with me about the AI community. Ai4 provides conferences that bring together some of the biggest names in the AI community from a variety of industries including tech, finance, healthcare, and a variety of others. They have been expanding what they do to include education which includes both paid courses as well as free YouTube videos. I was a panelist and host of a AI for finance and banking event which was a lot of fun....
Nov 17, 2020•56 min•Season 2Ep. 12
Send us a text I'm excited to have Dr. Peter Carr as a guest on the podcast. We sit down and discuss his career coming from academia to transitioning into the new field of quantitative finance and how he ended back in academia. We discuss the competition for quant talent as well as how MBA programs are in a bad situation with application numbers plummeting and how finance has split into two parts. We also discuss the question that many students have which is, "what goes into the application revi...
Nov 10, 2020•1 hr 24 min•Season 2Ep. 11
Send us a text Racing motocross is brutal! The hardest part of the sport is not what you see at the races or on TV. It's all the work behind the scenes. From working multiple jobs to pay bills and keep the bike going to coping with constant failures to injuries and bike failures; it really makes the sport a grueling one. To those not familiar with motocross (or supercross) it's not just sitting on a bike and driving around. The amount of physical strength and endurance is actually one of the mos...
Nov 03, 2020•27 min•Season 2Ep. 10
Send us a text In this episode of Talking Tuesday with Fancy Quant we discuss what are corporate politics, how to be aware of the political setting, and how to play corporate politics correctly. It's never fun when you get screwed by some political situation. One of the biggest pieces of advice on the political scene at a company is being aware of teams and biases. To be an ALL-STAR at the political game it is crucial to build trust with as many people as possible by being honest and telling the...
Oct 27, 2020•24 min•Season 2Ep. 9
Send us a text As someone who works in quantitative finance and runs one of the largest YouTube channels dedicated to quant finance, everyone wants me to talk about trading. First off, I'm not a trader and don't work for an investing firm. But the main reason is that everyone has an opinion on trading that they think is a fact. You really have two different camps and both are non-sense. The first camp are the business people in traditional finance. They worship Warren Buffet and think you can si...
Oct 20, 2020•17 min•Season 2Ep. 8
Send us a text America's university system is falling apart at the seams! Tuition costs continue to rise, the quality of education is falling, accreditation from the university system has become worthless, and standardized testing has lost its mind. In this episode I invited Louis a great friend of mine and ex-colleague to discuss these topics and provide some possible solutions. Both of us work in an industry that requires a master's degree at minimum and is highly technical (quantitative finan...
Oct 13, 2020•1 hr 23 min•Season 2Ep. 7
Send us a text A common question I get a lot is, what does a career path in quant finance look like? People assume doing math and stats doesn't change. We'll the process doesn't look much different than any other job. You start on small projects that have low impact and then get moved up to high profile, billion dollar projects where everyone is watching. You will then progress into management roles and a few lucky and skilled people will end up executives. I also discuss my personal goals in th...
Oct 06, 2020•24 min•Season 2Ep. 6
Send us a text The year 2020 has been crazy all on its own without talking about the economy or financial markets. There have been a lot of warning signs above and beyond the common sense. What's common sense about an economic crisis coming? Well think about the definition of GDP...which is Gross Domestic Production. That's the amount of output from people work. If a larger portion of society is unemployed due to Covid then GDP will naturally fall. One of the issues is that data including GDP ta...
Sep 29, 2020•17 min•Season 2Ep. 5
Send us a text Have you ever wondered how some people's lives just seem to progress so easily where as others seem like they are grinding with no results? One of the biggest differences comes down to social capital. I've seen many employees get their work done and be generally good people however to get that promotion you really need to build social capital. In this episode I'll chat about the definition of social capital, how to build social capital, and a few real word examples and their resul...
Sep 22, 2020•24 min•Season 2Ep. 4
Send us a text Have you ever thought about your perfect team? Who would be on that team? What characteristics would the team and the people on the team have? I discuss what a dream team is, the existence of a dream team, the individuals I would want on my dream team, and how to find new team mates. The idea seems far fetched as anyone who has hired or managed people knows how hard it is to find good people. On top of that, you still have to work within a company and alongside other teams. One of...
Sep 15, 2020•20 min•Season 1Ep. 3
Send us a text Risk management seems to have lost its meaning. After the 2008 financial crisis banks have started labeling every department as risk management in some way. While it would be great if every department understood the risks they create or manage to any company, the over use seems to have diminished its actual value and meaning. The skills required to work in "risk management" vary greatly depending on what area you want to work in. Someone who might work in model governance or a fir...
Sep 08, 2020•16 min•Season 2Ep. 2
Send us a text One aspect of life is all the emotions we have as individuals. One of the hardest pieces for me is managing my ego and I don't mean that in a one sided view of having a large ego. Being able to balance your ego is crucial for success in life as having more ego helps boost your confidence and allows you to take risk. Not having enough ego can prevent you from personal and career growth. For example, imagine you want to get married and have a family. If you are looking for a spouse ...
Sep 01, 2020•25 min•Season 2Ep. 1
Send us a text As someone who has worked from home off and on before the Covid-19 event, I figured I would cover some basic working from home ideas as well as some pointers for managers and some realizations about office versus home productivity. I even share a way to handle micro managers who don't fully embrace working from home. I originally thought after the pandemic people would go back to the usual office environment however from talking to a variety of managers, it seems like more compani...
May 26, 2020•31 min•Season 1Ep. 12
Send us a text Today's Talking Tuesday with Fancy Quant is all about his adventure to New York City. I'll discuss why I moved there, what it was like on Wall Street, and why I left. At the end I will highlight some fun experiences of living the Wall Street lifestyle. There are aspects such as the cleanliness that I didn't like but overall I loved living and working in NYC. The vast amounts of culture, the busy and exciting vibe of the city, and the amount of family, friends, and students that I ...
May 19, 2020•28 min•Season 1Ep. 11
Send us a text Being a Quant in the finance world is not all brains and riches as many think. Being able to talk openly about the industry hasn't been an easy task as I don't want to burn bridges and offend people, yet I feel it is important for those wanting to work in quantitative finance to really understand what you will face. This was originally a video I recorded a year ago however I felt like I highlighted too many negative aspects without a full picture of why they existed or how they im...
May 12, 2020•36 min•Season 1Ep. 10
Send us a text Have you ever wondered how to get ahead and develop a better career? Today Fancy Quant discusses starting a job, building relationship networks to help career advancement, and finally how and why to quit. This cycle of starting a new job, maintaining a current job, and ending the job will change frequency depending on career fit and career length. The higher you climb in a career the less positions are available meaning it is usually more advantageous to find a good company and tr...
May 05, 2020•43 min•Season 1Ep. 9
Send us a text What does a corporate financial analyst do? I asked myself this question as I was going to school for my BBA in Finance however I never found an honest response. I thought it would be a boring job as many people seemed to be talking all about investment banking or IB as they liked to call it. I decided in undergrad that I would try and work on the trading side or the investment banking side as it required more driven people. To my surprise I was actually doing corporate finance an...
Apr 28, 2020•25 min•Season 1Ep. 8
Send us a text Getting your first job after college (or graduate school) or always very hard. It seems like most students apply for hundreds of jobs and get very little feedback from employers. In this episode I discuss my failed attempts at getting a job after undergrad and then my continued failure as well as my short sprint of success. I learned a lot about resume writing and interviewing all from my bad experiences. Now as an industry professional I realize the lessons I learned were correct...
Apr 07, 2020•23 min•Season 1Ep. 7
Send us a text Being an introvert can be a challenge when you are surrounded by extroverts. Labels such as shy, anti-social, and narcissistic get thrown around as if you are a bad person. I read Susan Cain's "Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking" many years ago however the main message has stuck with me. In Western societies, communication and extroverted personalities are desired as they are deemed to be well rounded. This is evident when you look at the number of b...
Mar 31, 2020•32 min•Season 1Ep. 6
Send us a text My journey to becoming a quant (someone with math, stats, and computer science skills) was non-traditional. Most people are also shocked to find out that I hated secondary school and wasn't even sure I wanted to go to college. I wasn't the biggest fan of primary school either but looking back, I do miss the experience of primary school. College is where I really shined and re-found my curiosity for education and more traditional learning which lead me into statistics, financial en...
Mar 17, 2020•46 min•Season 1Ep. 5
