JobsJump Trading

Campus Quantitative Researcher, UG/MS (Intern)

Jump Trading · Chicago, IL · Front Office

Posted Aug 8, 2026 · We last checked this listing on Sep 20, 2026

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Likely interview questions for this role

Written from this job description, not a generic list. Each one notes what the interviewer is really checking.

Behavioral

Walk me through a math or stats problem you found genuinely hard and how you eventually cracked it.

whether the candidate has real depth of thought rather than surface familiarity with hard material

Tell me about a project where you had to write code that other people depended on. What happened when something broke.

whether they can write and own production-quality code, not just scripts for a class

What's something in the markets you've been following or trading yourself, and what's your actual view on it right now?

genuine, demonstrated interest in markets rather than a rehearsed answer

Describe a time you disagreed with a mentor or teammate about the right approach to a problem. What did you do?

ability to hold a position, argue it, and still collaborate well under Jump's competitive culture

Tell me about a time you took on real risk, in trading, competition, or otherwise, and it didn't pay off. What did you take from it.

appetite for risk-taking and how they process losses, since the posting explicitly wants risk-takers

Technical

Say I hand you a coin and ask if it's fair after you flip it 20 times and get 14 heads. How would you decide?

grasp of basic statistical inference and comfort quantifying uncertainty

You have a dataset of daily returns for a stock. How would you go about figuring out if there's any predictable structure in it, and how would you avoid fooling yourself?

understanding of overfitting and signal validation, core to quant research work

Explain what a p-value actually means to someone who has never taken a stats class.

depth of statistical understanding versus memorized formulas

If I gave you a coin that lands heads with unknown probability p and let you flip it as many times as you want, how would you construct a betting strategy that maximizes your long run growth?

familiarity with concepts like Kelly criterion and risk-adjusted decision making under uncertainty

How would you design a simple machine learning model to predict short term price moves, and what would worry you most about trusting its output?

machine learning fluency paired with healthy skepticism about spurious results

What is something in C++ or Python that tripped you up before you really understood it?

actual hands-on programming depth versus resume-listed familiarity

Situational

You're given a large order to fill in a market that moves against you as you trade. How would you think about breaking it up over time?

intuition for market microstructure and trading mechanics beyond pure math

You're working with a group of fellow interns on a shared trading strategy and two people want to take it in different directions with limited time left. How do you handle it?

how they operate in fast, collaborative, deadline-driven team settings

Practice this interview out loud.

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The full job description

As published by Jump Trading.

<p>Jump Trading Group is committed to world class research. We empower exceptional talents in Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science to seek scientific boundaries, push through them, and apply cutting edge research to global financial markets. Our culture is unique. Constant innovation requires fearlessness, creativity, intellectual honesty, and a relentless competitive streak. We believe in winning together and unlocking unique individual talent by incenting collaboration and mutual respect. At Jump, research outcomes drive more than superior risk adjusted returns. We design, develop, and deploy technologies that change our world, fund start-ups across industries, and partner with leading global research organizations and universities to solve problems.</p> <p>Our trading teams are each comprised of a dynamic group of traders, quantitative researchers, and engineers who work together to examine the global markets, seeking to understand the complexities of various traded products and exchanges. They leverage their impeccable statistical analysis and data mining skills, using the results of their research to make forecasts and develop profitable predictive trading models.</p> <p><strong>What You’ll Do:&nbsp;</strong></p> <p>The quant research internship is an intensive 10-week program focused on enhancing your quantitative and programming skills, as well as helping you experience what it’s like to be a full-time quant researcher at Jump.</p> <p>At Jump, our people contribute to trading teams in the following roles, or a blend of all three: quant researcher, quant trader, and quant developer. During our internship you will get training in all of these areas, with a focus on our research process for signal generation, machine learning, trading / market mechanics, C++, Python, and statistics.&nbsp;</p> <p>You will work with fellow interns to develop your own predictive models and automated trading strategies for live trading. Then you will have the opportunity to work with our trading teams on meaningful projects with real impact while receiving daily 1:1 mentorship from experienced quant researchers, traders, and developers.&nbsp;</p> <p>Other duties as assigned or needed.</p> <p><strong>Skills You’ll Need:</strong></p> <p>We are seeking the sharpest analytical minds from top undergraduate and graduate programs.&nbsp;</p> <p>Ideal candidates will have:</p> <ul> <li>Outstanding skills in computer science, machine learning, statistics, and mathematics&nbsp;</li> <li>Competitive spirit and uncommon drive to learn and improve</li> <li>Programming experience&nbsp;</li> <li>Appetite for risk-taking</li> <li>Demonstrated interest in financial markets&nbsp;</li> </ul> <p>Reliable and predictable availability required.</p> <p>INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS are encouraged to apply. We accept students eligible for CPT/OPT and we sponsor work visas for full-time positions.</p> <p>The estimated base salary for this role is $300,000 per year.</p>

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