As an Algo Dev, Bati appreciates his end-to-end control over the lifecycle of a trading strategy, from research to implementation to backtesting and monitoring. This dynamic blend of statistical analysis, machine learning techniques, and programming brings unique challenges to Bati's day-to-day role.

Learn how Algorithm Developers at HRT differ from quant roles at other firms in our latest installment of #CareersatHRT. In his words, “squares are shapes, but not all shapes are squares.” 😉

What I love most about being an algo developer is that finance is probably a problem that will never get solved So it's always perpetually interesting, but it's also very exciting because you know hard puzzles are what really motivates me I'm Batty.

I'm an algo developer here at HRT in the London office and I've been here since 2022.

An algo developer at HRT is responsible for developing and improving our trading algorithms.

We are really what sort of drives the profits because we research and implement new signals that we can trade on all the way to how we take existing signals, modify them to make them better and trade them a lot more efficiently.

An algo developer differs from quant roles.

For example, Some firms, quants, make research and they give it to a trader, whereas at HRT we have full control because we're systematic.

An algo developer at HRT, compared to a quant who just does research, has

I would say an algo developer is a quant, but not necessarily always the other way around.

Alright, squares and circles are shapes, but not all shapes are squares.

My team works on mid-frequency signals, which cover anything from a couple of minutes all the way to infinity, but realistically a couple of weeks.

So to contrast that, a lot of shorter term strategies will work in milliseconds, microseconds.

We have to take a very long term view on how we think the stock's gonna go up.

Our trading tends to be a lot more risky because we trade over longer horizons.

So there's a lot more chance of us getting things wrong.

But on the other side, we're able to trade

with a lot more money than with a lot of the shorter term strategies.

So we provide, I would say, an orthogonal sort of component to what HRT is like famous and top in the world of doing.

The skills that are necessary to do the kind of work that I do, I would say a lot of statistical and machine learning tools are very necessary.

Programming helps a lot because we implement and run our own trading strategies.

So you have to be comfortable enough implementing and running things in Python.

The amount of ideas you can try is obviously limited by how capable you are as a programmer.

It's important to be able to communicate your work to others and work with others.

So you have to be very, very skeptical, and you have to also communicate to people and show them that you've actually eliminated a lot of the possible things that could go wrong.

I'm originally from Turkey, And ever since I was 6 years old, I always wanted to work in finance.

No, I didn't even know finance existed until 6.

After my PhD, I decided to stay in academia.

I was a postdoc for 2 years but at the end of the day I felt it was

a little bit too isolating and very very slow-paced and that's why

HRT is very well known and I was immediately interested because I know their reputation is probably the top firm if not the top couple and during my interview process I saw how very computationally efficient things are and how the research environment here is very free, very free flowing.

Although the numbers of people have grown, it still feels like a startup and there's a lot of flexibility and research and that really appealed to me.

and we are sort of tight-knit here so I end up socializing a lot with people in other roles.

That makes it a lot more interesting because you get a broad overview of what people work on.

I go lunch with a lot of people who are not Algo developers.

I tend to work primarily with people in York.

And because people tend to work from home in New York as well, it's not just the London people who are joining via Zoom on any given meeting.

Outside of work, most of my time gets taken up by my dog.

a recurring theme going on, trying to figure out how exactly to climb the route, how you can shift your body.

It's a nice way of like getting fit while not really realizing it.

What I love about HRT is here there's a culture of releasing things very quickly So once you have an idea and you know that the idea works, getting it into production is in a matter of days rather than weeks.

People drive you to be a lot better yourself.

And it's very important for me to be around people who are like intellectually curious and very very good and clever.


Speaker 0: What I love most about being an algo developer is that finance is probably a problem that will never get solved So it's always perpetually interesting, but it's also very exciting because you know hard puzzles are what really motivates me I'm Batty. I'm an algo developer here at HRT in the London office and I've been here since 2022. An algo developer at HRT is responsible for developing and improving our trading algorithms. We are really what sort of drives the profits because we research and implement new signals that we can trade on all the way to how we take existing signals, modify them to make them better and trade them a lot more efficiently. An algo developer differs from quant roles.

For example, Some firms, quants, make research and they give it to a trader, whereas at HRT we have full control because we're systematic. An algo developer at HRT, compared to a quant who just does research, has

Speaker 1: a lot more influence on the output of

Speaker 0: the whole trading system. I would say an algo developer is a quant, but not necessarily always the other way around. Alright, squares and circles are shapes, but not all shapes are squares. My team works on mid-frequency signals, which cover anything from a couple of minutes all the way to infinity, but realistically a couple of weeks. So to contrast that, a lot of shorter term strategies will work in milliseconds, microseconds.

So our trading is a

Speaker 1: lot more directional. We have to take a very long term view on how we think the stock's gonna go up.

Speaker 0: Our trading tends to be a lot more risky because we trade over longer horizons. So there's a lot more chance of us getting things wrong. But on the other side, we're able to trade

Speaker 1: with a lot more money than with a lot of the shorter term strategies. So we provide, I would say, an orthogonal sort of component to what HRT is like famous and top in the world of doing.

Speaker 0: The skills that are necessary to do the kind of work that I do, I would say a lot of statistical and machine learning tools are very necessary. Programming helps a lot because we implement and run our own trading strategies. So you have to be comfortable enough implementing and running things in Python. The amount of ideas you can try is obviously limited by how capable you are as a programmer. It's important to be able to communicate your work to others and work with others.

There's a lot of ways to be wrong. So you have to be very, very skeptical, and you have to also communicate to people and show them that you've actually eliminated a lot of the possible things that could go wrong. I'm originally from Turkey, And ever since I was 6 years old, I always wanted to work in finance. That's not actually true. I was gonna say, what happened at 6?

No, I didn't even know finance existed until 6. I got a PhD in probability theory. After my PhD, I decided to stay in academia. I was a postdoc for 2 years but at the end of the day I felt it was

Speaker 1: a little bit too isolating and very very slow-paced and that's why

Speaker 0: I decided to switch to finance. HRT is very well known and I was immediately interested because I know their reputation is probably the top firm if not the top couple and during my interview process I saw how very computationally efficient things are and how the research environment here is very free, very free flowing. Although the numbers of people have grown, it still feels like a startup and there's a lot of flexibility and research and that really appealed to me. The London office is a lot smaller

Speaker 1: than the New York office

Speaker 0: and we are sort of tight-knit here so I end up socializing a lot with people in other roles. That makes it a lot more interesting because you get a broad overview of what people work on. I go lunch with a lot of people who are not Algo developers. I tend to work primarily with people in York. And because people tend to work from home in New York as well, it's not just the London people who are joining via Zoom on any given meeting.

Outside of work, most of my time gets taken up by my dog. I also like to go climbing. It's like

Speaker 1: a nice fun hobby of mine.

Speaker 0: I like that it's solving

Speaker 1: puzzles. Might be

Speaker 0: a recurring theme going on, trying to figure out how exactly to climb the route, how you can shift your body. It's a nice way of like getting fit while not really realizing it. What I love about HRT is here there's a culture of releasing things very quickly So once you have an idea and you know that the idea works, getting it into production is in a matter of days rather than weeks. People here are very, very smart. You can pick up a lot of things.

People drive you to be a lot better yourself. And it's very important for me to be around people who are like intellectually curious and very very good and clever.

See all Hudson River Trading transcripts on Youtube

Mind Meets Market: Bati's Journey From Academia to Algorithmic Trading