<p>I'm a JMU (James Madison University) student and finished first year with great GPA. Currently double major in Quantitative Finance and Accounting.</p>
<p>Many people suggest to me transfer to UVA, but they do not have undergraduate Quantitave Finance program.</p>
<p>I heard JMU Quantitative Finance major makes way much more than UVA Finance major, but UVA reputation is greater than JMU.</p>
<p>What should I do?</p>
<p>Anyone have idea about job perspective and starting salary for JMU Quantitative Finance major and UVA finance major??</p>
<p>Thanks in advance for your help...</p>
<ol>
<li><p>If you want to get into Wall Street, money should never be a motivation.. or you will just burn out and crash.</p></li>
<li><p>In my opinion, I think one would need a grad/PhD in math, stats or quan finance in order to do real well (i.e. make more than people in regular finance)..</p></li>
</ol>
<p>the reason being that the new field on wall street these days are programmed trading, statistical arbitrage, capitral structure arbitrate, are all obviously, math related.. and an undergrad. degree just won suffice.</p>
<p>in addition, heavy stat/math oriented jobs, i.e. derivatives sales and trading usually like to hire people from physics/engineering/math PhD programs...</p>
<p>however, with that being said, quan finance can place you onto a nice fixed-income trading desk.. (bear stearns <-- the firm that i worked for, lehman brothers) which is the hot area on wall street.. i.e. credit derivatives, structured finance (CDOs, synthetics, asset backed securities).. so on and so forth.. the finance that they do is kind of different than what a typicall finance major would do.. because it's so quant based.</p>
<p>typical finance majors go into corp finance.. but it gives them more options in the future.. i.e. jump into private equity, hedge funds... and etc..</p>
<p>but quant finance majors, in my guestimation.. stay on the trading floor.. or end up starting his or her own fund... i would imagine that it's rare for a quant guy to jump into a private equity firm.. because the jobs are so different.</p>
<p>but in your case.. keep in mind that connections do matter.. your major means crap if firms do not hire at your school..</p>
<p>I know for sure that Citigroup recruits at UVA, because I've spoken with a banker that actually recruits there. =)</p>