Market coverage

The ten cities where quant hires

Ranked by depth of opportunity, with the demand profile, resident firms and compensation level for each market.

Market guides: 17
Roles benchmarked: 18
Deepest market: New York
Priced in: Local currency

KnowQuant research deskUpdated 1 September 202617 hub markets pricedMethod 2026.1

Where are the best cities for quant jobs?

New York, London and Chicago are the three deepest quant markets globally, followed by Singapore, Hong Kong and Amsterdam. New York leads on research and multi-strategy hiring, Chicago on high-frequency trading and low-latency engineering, London on systematic macro, and Dubai is currently the fastest-growing market of all.

Global quant hub markets ranked by opportunity
#	Market	Opportunity	Main demand	Researcher reference estimate
1	New York	Exceptional	Quant research, systematic trading, quant dev, ML, data	$475k
2	London	Exceptional	Quant research/trading, systematic funds, electronic trading	£319k
3	Chicago	Exceptional	HFT, market making, options, quant trading, C++	$461k
4	Singapore	Very strong	Systematic trading, commodities, macro, quant research	S$522k
5	Hong Kong	Very strong	Equities, derivatives, systematic trading, China-focused strategies	HK$3.1m
6	Amsterdam	Very strong	HFT, market making, trading technology	€323k
7	San Francisco	Strong	AI/ML-heavy quant research, crypto, data and engineering	$451k
8	Paris	Strong	Quant research, derivatives, banks, systematic strategies	€297k
9	Zurich / Geneva	Strong / niche	Systematic funds, commodities, private capital	CHF 376k
10	Dubai / Abu Dhabi	Fast-growing	Hedge funds, systematic teams, portfolio managers, commodities	AED 1.5m
11	Boston	Strong / niche	Systematic research, asset management quant, data science	$409k
12	Austin	Fast-growing	Electronic trading, quant development, market making	$418k
13	Greenwich / Stamford	Strong / niche	Systematic research, multi-strategy platforms, portfolio construction	$461k
14	Sydney	Strong / niche	Market making, options trading, quant development	A$520k
15	Toronto	Fast-growing	Electronic trading, quant development, systematic research	C$456k
16	Mumbai	Fast-growing	Quant development, research support, data engineering, risk	₹8.7m
17	Shanghai	Strong / niche	China onshore strategies, market making, systematic trading	¥1.9m

New York

Exceptional

The deepest quant talent market in the world, and the reference point for global compensation.

London

Exceptional

Europe's quant capital and the main hub for systematic macro and long-horizon systematic funds.

Chicago

Exceptional

The global centre of gravity for high-frequency trading, options market making and low-latency engineering.

Singapore

Very strong

A long-established regional quant hub, and the base for many systematic and commodities desks.

Hong Kong

Very strong

The primary access point for China-focused systematic and derivatives strategies.

Amsterdam

Very strong

Europe's market-making capital, and an engineering-led market.

San Francisco

Strong

Where quant finance overlaps with frontier machine learning and digital assets.

Paris

Strong

Deep derivatives-quant talent pool, fed by an exceptional mathematics pipeline.

Zurich / Geneva

Strong / niche

Small, high-quality market concentrated in systematic funds and commodities.

Dubai / Abu Dhabi

#10

Fast-growing

A market that has expanded quickly on portfolio-manager relocation and the absence of personal income tax.

Boston

#11

Strong / niche

A research-led market built on long-horizon asset management rather than latency trading.

Austin

#12

Fast-growing

A US location that has grown quickly as firms relocated trading and engineering teams to Texas.

Greenwich / Stamford

#13

Strong / niche

Connecticut's hedge fund corridor, where large systematic and multi-strategy managers hire outside Manhattan.

Sydney

#14

Strong / niche

A compact market-making hub that hires early-career trading and engineering talent in volume.

Toronto

#15

Fast-growing

Canada's quant centre, growing on trading and engineering offices opened out of Chicago and New York.

Mumbai

#16

Fast-growing

A substantial build-out of quant engineering and research support capacity outside the established hubs.

Shanghai

#17

Strong / niche

The onshore route into Chinese markets, staffed locally by firms that already trade the region from Hong Kong.

Choosing where to hire next?

The desk ranks all sixteen markets on live vacancies, pay and candidate depth. Book a call and we will walk you through the read on any of them.

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Sixteen markets, one index

Each city ranked on the roles actually open there

Counts, pay in local currency and the firms with a desk on the ground. Pick a market and the evidence opens up.

Methodology

Figures are expressed as annual total compensation (base salary plus expected performance bonus) in the reference market's local currency, converted from a US dollar base. They describe typical market ranges rather than any individual offer, and exclude sign-on payments, deferred equity and carried interest. Portfolio-manager figures reflect formulaic profit-share arrangements and are therefore far more dispersed than any other role.

KnowQuantIndex 2026.1 · Updated September 2026

Modelled bands describe the market, not an individual offer. Where an employer states pay, the stated figure is used and labelled as such.