This year, for Quant Summer Intern roles in the U.S. market, weekly pay for some positions has reached roughly $7,000–$8,800. Meanwhile, total compensation for full-time Quant New-Grad packages has climbed to approximately $700,000.

If there is one type of role in the U.S. job market these past two years that makes people double‑check for a misplaced decimal point after seeing the compensation, it is Quant.

Optiver has recently raised the bar once again.

According to recently disclosed figures, Optiver posted approximately €4.5 billion in net trading revenue and €1.7 billion in net profit for 2025, representing a year‑over‑year increase of roughly 30%. More notably, the firm’s strong profitability is translating more directly into compensation for new hires.

This year, for Quant Summer Intern roles in the U.S. market, weekly pay for some positions has reached roughly $7,000–$8,800. Meanwhile, total compensation for full‑time Quant New‑Grad packages has climbed to around $700,000.

Converted into local currency, a newly hired graduate can earn the equivalent of 5 million RMB per year.

High quant compensation is nothing new, of course. What truly deserves attention is another shift at Optiver over the past two years: the firm has begun a clear expansion drive.

01 More Important Than the 5‑Million‑RMB Salary: Optiver Is Expanding

When people talk about elite quant firms, the names that usually come up are Jane Street, HRT and Citadel Securities.

Optiver, by contrast, has long kept a lower profile.

Over the last two years, however, its footprint in the U.S. market has grown substantially. Its New York office continues to expand with headcount increases, and U.S. operations stand as one of the firm’s key growth priorities. For job seekers, this matters more than the headline 5‑million‑RMB salary figure. No matter how generous the pay, if a firm hires only a handful of people annually, it remains out of reach for most students.

A rise in headcount (HC) changes the equation. Especially for international students targeting 2027 Summer Internships, 2027 New‑Grad roles, and even those already planning for the 2028 cohort, Optiver belongs on every quant target list.

Unlike many traditional financial institutions, Optiver does not prioritize finance backgrounds. Students majoring in Mathematics, Statistics, Physics, Computer Science, Electrical Engineering and other engineering disciplines are its primary recruitment focus.

The reasoning is straightforward: Optiver runs a highly mature training program for new joiners.

02 You Can Get Into Quant Without a Finance Background

A common misconception among STEM international students is: “I haven’t studied finance, so I have no shot.” In reality, for market makers like Optiver, recruiters care far less about how many financial terms you have memorized. They value probability, mathematics, logic, programming, rapid learning and decision‑making capabilities.

New hires go through structured onboarding. Optiver’s Global Optiver Academy delivers centralized training covering trading, options, market making and other core topics. Trainees then move on to simulated trading and strategy training before gradually gaining exposure to live markets.

In short, their mindset is not “hire someone who already knows how to trade.” It is “find someone with the right aptitude for trading and train them.”

That explains why many STEM students with no finance internships, no investment banking experience, and almost no trading exposure as undergraduates can still land offers at top quant firms. One easy‑to‑miss caveat: relaxed background requirements do not mean the firm is easy to get into. Quite the opposite.

03 The First OA Is Where Most Candidates Get Filtered Out

Optiver’s screening process is rigorous starting with the online assessment. This year’s quant recruitment OA still centers on probability, numerical sense, logic, rapid mental calculation and trading intuition, with question types including Number Logic, Likelihood, Intervals and Orderbook problems.

Many of these are not standard math exercises. Orderbook questions, for example, simulate live market‑making scenarios: you must observe bid and ask prices, spot arbitrage opportunities, manage positions and make judgments under tight time pressure. This is where many first‑time quant applicants stumble. Having completed LeetCode problems does not prepare you for a trading‑focused OA; having studied probability theory does not guarantee fast probabilistic reasoning within seconds.

Even applicants with high GPAs, prestigious school credentials and solid technical backgrounds can be overwhelmed on their first Optiver OA. Quant hiring does not merely test raw intelligence; it assesses whether you have completed targeted preparation.

The barrier to entry for quant roles is not written in the job description. It is embedded in successive rounds of OAs, technical interviews, trading interviews and probability puzzles.

We have compiled quant online tests from the following firms:

1️⃣ JPM 2027 VI + OA

2️⃣ Barclays 2027 OA

3️⃣ Citadel 2027 OA

4️⃣ HRT 2027 OA

5️⃣ Optiver 2027 OA

6️⃣ Akuna 2027 OA

7️⃣ Millennium 2027 OA

We have assembled a collection of 27 quant OA questions covering both Graduate and Intern roles, which is continuously being updated. Message【quant】to access it.