I am soon finishing my PhD in Finance and want to transition (back) into the industry, however into a more technical role.
Preferably from first or second-hand experience,
(0) how would you assess the chances of getting into a Software Engineering (for example Automated Trading) or Data Science role in the financial sector (investment banks, market-makers, funds etc.) without a formal Computer Science/Mathematics/Physics education?
(1) are you aware of roles in the financial sector for which it is valuable having experience in software engineering above the regular Finance/Economics education?
In my experience, employers value specialized expertise only in one domain. For example, I have read from one company that they seek outstanding graduates in CS and promise to take care of the basic finance education on the job. Would you agree with my interpretation?
To put the question into context: I will graduate from a European University with a background in Economics (both are, say, in the top quartile in Europe) and have some work experience as a Consultant. I have specialized in Econometrics and worked almost exclusively on empirical projects. In terms of programming, I have worked for 3 years almost full-time with/on the following: Matlab/Python/SQL Server/High Performance Computing, scientific/statistical programming (Numba and bits of C++ for speed, parallel computing for simulations with MPI). I started programming with 14.
Thanks for your input!