Exercise library
Downloadable take-home tasks
26 recruiter-style exercises across quant, trading and operations. Download the starter file, complete it offline, then mark your work against the scheme.
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Quant Research & Quant Trading
Quant Research tasks
Monte Carlo Option Pricer
Price options by simulation under risk-neutral GBM: a European call with standard errors benchmarked against Black-Scholes, antithetic variance reduction, then a path-dependent Asian option with no closed form.
Alpha Signal from Market Data
Engineer a predictive feature from a daily price series, turn it into a lookahead-free trading signal, and backtest it honestly - Sharpe, hit rate, turnover and an out-of-sample check.
Vol Surface Analysis
Clean a quotes file, build an implied-vol surface and comment on skew and term structure.
Pairs Trading & Cointegration
Estimate a hedge ratio, test the spread for stationarity and half-life, then backtest a z-score strategy honestly with costs and an out-of-sample split.
Black-Scholes Pricer
Complete a European option pricer and return the Greeks for a given parameter set.
Order-Book Feature Extraction
Turn raw top-of-book snapshots and the trade tape into the microstructure features signal models consume - mid, spread, imbalance, microprice, signed flow and rolling VWAP - in clean, windowed SQL with a pandas cross-check.
Market-Making Simulation
Quote a two-sided market on a simulated random-walk asset: capture spread while skewing quotes to manage inventory under a hard position limit. The take-home version of the market-making game used in trading interviews.
Binomial / American Pricer
Build a Cox-Ross-Rubinstein lattice, confirm it converges to Black-Scholes, then price an American put and report the early-exercise premium.
VaR Backtest Starter
Implement a historical VaR estimate and backtest exceptions against realised PnL.
Trading & Execution
Trading tasks
Options Payoff Matrix
Build the expiry payoff of a two-leg options strategy across a spot grid - per-leg and total P&L, net debit, max profit, max loss and breakeven - then read the risk off a payoff diagram.
Market-Making Decision Game
Make a two-sided market on a hidden-value security: quote around a fair estimate, skew against inventory, and learn the value from order flow - the take-home form of the interview market-making game.
Trading Case: EV & Sizing
Work a list of opportunities the trader's way: compute expected value and the Kelly stake, take only the real edges, and size them to the edge with fractional Kelly.
Options Greeks Worksheet
Compute and interpret the Greeks for a small options book under given market data.
Daily PnL Attribution
Decompose desk PnL across price move, FX, fees and carry and reconcile to the reported total.
Hedging Scenario Matrix
Build a scenario matrix showing position risk and the hedge required across spot moves.
Trading Operations & Middle Office
Trading Operations tasks
Reconciliation Break Matching
Match the internal book to the broker statement, classify every break by type and catch the one-sided items in both directions.
Trade Settlement Query Set
Write the SQL behind the morning fails report: settlement status per trade, the failing trades, counts by status and fails aged by counterparty.
Failed Trades Log Parsing
Turn an overnight settlement log into the morning fails summary with a short shell pipeline — counts, top reasons, worst counterparty, repair list.
Trade Blotter Completion
Complete the missing booking field and flag every row that breaks the booking rules before anything settles.
PnL Attribution Sheet
Rebuild each desk's PnL from its drivers, reconcile to the front-office figure and isolate the position whose PnL doesn't explain.
Python Reconciliation Logic
Reconcile an internal trade record against the custodian statement in pandas: merge, classify every break with a tolerance, summarise and triage.
Corporate Actions & Entitlements
Turn a book of client positions and four announced events into correct entitlements, adjusted positions and exception flags.
Cash & Nostro Reconciliation
Reconcile an internal cash ledger to a nostro statement, classify the breaks and prove the result against a control total.
Risk (Market, Credit & Model Risk)
Risk (Market, Credit tasks
Credit Expected-Loss & Exposure
Size expected loss across a counterparty book, apply netting and collateral, and flag limit breaches.
Portfolio VaR Calculator
Compute parametric and historical VaR for a multi-position book, decompose it into component VaR and quantify the diversification benefit.
Stress Test & Scenario Matrix
Revalue a book under prescribed factor shocks, build a scenario PnL grid and identify the worst case.