Originally Posted by Unregistered

Like another guy say having a friend or father inside definitely help but my guess is that most people here do not have and that is why they are still in this forum. My rmore reliable methods will increase your chance to get into front office by 100% from 1% to 2%.... isn't it great ? you have now 98% instead of 99% of failure. I am not being sarcastic here but really no matter what you do, the odds are very against you. I am assuming here you have no connection at all.

Ok. remember front office people are like exclusive club members and to join them is like a club deal-- either you are in, or you are out. If you are out, you will always be blocked at the door, no matter how close you are e.g middle office. So the idea is to get in through the weakest link into the club house. Therefore, it is no point for you to be the top performer in the settlement department, holds MFE/CFA/CPA/MBA, straight A students , best engineer in town, best computing knowledge etc.... than an lowly paid dealer in the smallest brokerage house.

Front office normally refer to dealers, traders, treasury sales, investment banker, fund manager (in Asset Mgt house and so much in banking) etc.... among them the pay scale, standard, demand/supply, barrier of entry differ by a lot a lot. An oil trader in top notch bank earns millions of dollar while a house dealer in a small local brokerage barely take home $2000 monthly. However, they are all called front office personal, they are all watching markets using Bloomberg/reuters, they are all doing sales in 1 form or another (difference is in the ticket size), they all attend conference and market talk, they all speak same language e,g long/short, mine/yours, pips/basis etc.., they all swear in the dealing room, they all go drinking everyday etc...

so if you are an average grader from ordinary university with no connection/knowledge/relevant experience, go and join the easiest FO position regardless of how low the salary is. As mentioned, you can join as a house dealer in brokerage, future broker, money or oil broker.... if all else fail, join brokerage as a remisier and get to know the who-who in the market. Get into the dealing room in any bank or brokerage 1st as an intern, coffee boy, trader assistant, research analyst, temp staff, trainee etc..... just secure a leg inside 1st. Always fight to be a temp trainee in the FO than to be perm team manager in operations, bossing over 10 men, if given 2 choices. Most of the above do not require fanciful degrees from Oxbridge or MFE/CFA, just an ordinary degree with CMFAS module 1 and 6 for some (which any tom, dick and henry can easily take and pass) will do
this first step of getting in is always the hardest and most sacrifice (in pay, security ... etc) are made.

After you get in, you are one of the club member... the next step (much easier now) is to connect with other "higher-level" FO people in position of your choice be it swap trader, credit trader, investment banker, fund manager, derivative trading, structuring, money market, treasury sales etc ... then next is to connect to the FO of better house...example from local brokerage to local bank, from local bank to European bank, from European bank to US consumer bank, then finally to US investment bank , example only, not to say which is better.... long way to go for career building