JP Morgan Interview Experience for Quantitative Researcher | On-Campus 2022

JP Morgan visited our campus for a QR role for placements in Dec 2021. The whole process consisted of 4 rounds.

Round 1(Online Assessment Test): They held an online test on cocubes platform in which there were 2 Papers, First paper consisted of 3 sections that had MCQs and the Second paper consisted of one coding section. 

• In the first paper, the first section consisted of math questions (5) and they were of moderate level. The second section consisted of Probability and Counting questions – medium-hard (14). The third section consisted of Data structure and Algorithm MCQs – Easy (11). The second paper consisted of 2 Coding questions (Easy-medium).  
• They shortlisted around 30 students for the interviews.

Round 2(Interview 1 – 1hr 10mins): This round mostly tested my C++ and Math skills.  

• The interviewer asked me in which language do I code and I answered C++. 
• He asked about OOP in C++. 
• He started with basics and moved on to the more complex ones. 
• He asked about Encapsulation, Abstraction, asked me to explain Polymorphism with a real-world example and how internally run time polymorphism works (vtables and vpointers). 
• He then asked about the Multiple Inheritance and Diamond Problem.  
• He asked about why do we need a Copy constructor and can It be private. 
• He then moved on to the differences between shallow copy and deep copy and what does the copy constructor does. He then asked me whether I know any design patterns and I answered yes and I named singleton and factory. 
• He asked deeply about singleton when and where do we use it and an example of it where it is used. 
• He then asked me a probability question: Find the expected value of the number of coin tosses to get 2 consecutive heads i.e, “HH”. (Link). I wrote the recurrence relation and he was satisfied. 
• He then moved on to the Coding question, he asked me to code to detect whether there is a cycle in a) directed graph and b) undirected graph. He asked me if I have any questions. I asked about the work-life at JPMC and how the current team is going to be. (Be prepared with some nice questions beforehand) . I answered all the questions and I got the call for the next round.

Round 3(Interview 2 – 45 mins): This round is mostly tested my Coding and Probability skills. He started with probability puzzles.

1. If I flip a fair coin 10 times, what’s the expected number of “HH” observed.  For this, I was trying to write a recurrence as well, but I couldn’t exactly get it. He then gave a clue of defining a random variable X_i if both the ith and (i+1)th toss are heads and then apply the Linearity of expectation to it. I picked up on the clue and solved it. Later I found the same question being on stackexchange.
2. What is the probability that n points lie on the same side of the semi-circle. This is a very standard question which I saw before and hence answered it. 

He then moved on to coding questions which were pretty standard ones,

1. https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/minimum-time-required-so-that-all-oranges-become-rotten/ 
2. Detect Cycle in a graph 

I answered all the above questions and then the interviewer asked if I had any questions. I asked him regarding the work at JPMC and how different JPMC is doing compared to GS and other investment banks. It’s always good if you make the interviewer that you are keen on working with the company and wanted to know more about it.

Round 4(HR Round – 15mins): This is a general HR round where she asked why I was interested in working at JPMC. 

• Where do I live? 
• Am I willing to relocate etc.
• All the rounds went well and JPMC hired 3 students from our college.

NOTE: 

• Do practice Quant, Probability, and puzzles as they play a very important role in interviews in many companies. There are many resources out there, I followed 
• Heard on Street
• Practical Guide to Quant Finance(https://usermanual.wiki/Document/Practical20Guide20To20Quantitative20Finance20Interview.604244935.pdf)
• Don’t lose your hope if not selected in your dream companies. I lost my whole confidence when I didn’t get selected for Apple and Google even though I answered all the questions in the online rounds. The thing with interviews is they are hugely dependent on LUCK. It would highly depend on the interviewer and questions too. So being panic, and talking about other easy interviews with your friends, just makes you feel more demotivated. 
• On the day of the interview be calm as you will be interviewing many companies immediately, don’t lose your patience.