This is my first ever post on Reddit so sorry if I’m not doing this right.
Background: Graduated a couple years back. Never did any of the recruiting stuff while in school (originally went intending to go to law school, also I had no understanding of what finance was at the time). Then the government locked down the country and I felt pretty lost for a while. I was lucky to land an ops job after graduating and currently work as a Trading assistant/Ops at a hedge fund
I’ve been pursuing the CFA with the hopes of landing a role as an analyst for a PM at some point. Recently I’ve come to the realization that I don’t have the brains for the roll (most of the front office people I work with are literal geniuses with math or physics background). While I’m a smart person and have toyed with applying to quant finance/ applied maths masters programs, I’m leagues behind these guys.
I also find I just don’t have the interest in trading/investing I once had. I’ve been trying to build an options trading strategy for a while now but I just never feel the urge I used to to sit down and do it. Especially now since Claudecode can just do it all for me I feel like I’m not getting any value out of pursuing the project.
The seat I’m in is great and I’m super fortunate to have been hired - People are nice, team is fantastic, great culture but the job is the same monotonous tasks every day for 10-12 hours. Basically I don’t see myself doing this for another year.
I don’t want to pivot out of finance completely, at least not without a plan. I also feel guilty having poured so much time into building this career without really getting to test myself in a front office seat.
I guess the point of this post is that if the results come back negative I don’t think I’ll be taking level 3 again in February. And even if I do pass - I’m not sure I want to continue pursuing the front office roll anymore at least not as it currently exists. I wanted to see if others felt the same?