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Barclays Capital Interview Questions & Reviews in London, UK Area

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Web: www.barcap.com | HQ: London, United Kingdom

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Updated Apr 27, 2012 – Interview questions and reviews posted anonymously by interview candidates.
Ratings are reflective of location and job title.

Difficulty Rating [?] Based on 31 ratings

3.4

“Difficult” Interview

Interview Experience [?] Based on 31 ratings

Positive	58%
Neutral	23%
Negative	19%

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21–30 of 31 Barclays Capital Interviews

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4.0

Difficult Interview

Overall Positive Experience

Received and Accepted Offer

Interviewed Nov 2009 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took 2 weeks)

First, a phone interview mostly based on my personal background (personality test) along with classical questions such as: Why Barcap ? Why did you choose to study math ? Why do you want to work on a trading desk ?
Then the assessment center in London: one full day of 1:1 interviews (4 in my case) with operationals from different desks + a trading game (1h30).
Finally, the "final round": got interviewed by a full desk (3 traders). They asked me a lot of technical questions and checked my quantitative background, they also explained to me what products they trade.

Interview Questions

Write a quasi-algorithm that computes the implicit volatility (i.e. numerically inverts the Black-Scholes formula) with the Newton-Raphson method.

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Other Details

I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview and a 1:1 Interview.

Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

View Comments (1)

Inappropriate?

4.0

Difficult Interview

Overall Positive Experience

Interviewed and No Offer

Interviewed Jan 2009 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took 1 week)

Had two phone interviews, i've been asked about rates and index levels, questions to assess my knowledge of barcap, correlation behavior of certains products (Worst of, Best of, asian call and put), define smile and skew, smile impact on auto call and digital, and several classic brainteasers : hat colors, number of small cubes in the outer layer of a 10x10x10 cube. What do you think of barcap's strategy for the years to come? What do you think of the impact of oil price on the economy

Interview Questions

What's your point of view on barcap's strategy for the years to come?

Answer Question

oil price impact on economy

Answer Question

Other Details

I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.

Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

3.0

Average Interview

Overall Neutral Experience

Interviewed and No Offer

Interviewed Aug 2008 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took 2 days)

I had 2 interviews with two market data managers and then an interview with the regional market data manager. First two interviews were competency based and I did very well. Third interview was with the regional market data manager and was a vary vague interview on problem solving skills. He didn't like me.

Interview Questions

How would you help me if you had this job?

Answer Question

They checked my knowledge of a long list of market data products.

Answer Question

Other Details

I got the interview through a Recruiter and the interview consisted of a 1:1 Interview.

Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

4.0

Difficult Interview

Overall Positive Experience

Interviewed and No Offer

Interviewed Jan 2010 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took 1 week)

Good interview process. Phone discussion with agent. Agent put me forward to client. Phone conversation with client - client makes sure I have arms, legs and a head and that I have basically done the job per the CV. Invites me for an interview in the next week. Interviewed by two chaps who were friedly but asked good questions, enabled me to shine etc. Was good having them both there as they can cross check with each other so saves 3/4/5/6/7 stage interview process which can drag with no promise of a good outcome.

Interview Questions

Why should we hire you specifically for this job from all the applications we have had?

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Other Details

I got the interview through a Recruiter and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview and a 1:1 Interview.

Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

3.0

Average Interview

Overall Negative Experience

Interviewed and No Offer

Interviewed Nov 2009 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took 2 months)

This was the second round for the MBA full time program. After two great interviews (and outstanding interviewers) during the first round, I had the interview with the head of the desk... This guy had me over the phone for barely 15 minutes, called late and asked only 2 questions... I don't understand why even took the time to make the interview if it was going to be this way...

Interview Questions

Tell me about yourself

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Why Barcap?

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Other Details

I got the interview through a College or University and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.

Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

3.0

Average Interview

Overall Neutral Experience

Interviewed and No Offer

Interviewed Jan 2010 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took a day)

Several online programming skills tests - you know the kind that only test knowledge, not whether people are actually capable of doing a job. I think you are expected to pass these with flying colours.

Face to Face interview:
All the people involved seemed nice enough but everything felt very rushed. This may be deliberate to see how you cope under the pressure. First a brief intro by the development manager followed by trawling through some terribly constructed programming examples of two classes - a cat and a dog?! which you have to critique. Mainly requires exact knowledge of syntax and keywords with little or no emphasis on correct approach or best practice. This is offputting if you're looking for somewhere that aspires to do things properly.

After that I was asked by the development manager essentially to describe what I understood by an agile development process amongst other questions with some implication that I should understand their exact process without having worked in it. I think this is to figure out if you would enjoy/despise bending over and having the large iron fist of Barclays Capital plunge your inner depths.

Another question from them was "How did you have time to do all of these things outside of work?".

When I asked what the "greatest challenges" of working in this role were the near corpse of a man sitting opposite me pulled a face of despair, sighed and groaned "it's just getting everything done. no matter how much you do they [the business] always want more". Confronted with this ghost of my working future and the fact the other two interviewers were barely out of nappies (the sheep settle better in the fold when young I'm told) I decided that the gulf between BarCap and my values was just too wide and I think the feeling was mutual.

The clock ticked past the critical second and the interview was stopped mid-sentence.

I'm told BarCap varies hugely by team so please don't be put off by my experience. I would apply there again with an open mind.

Interview Questions

What do you understand by an agile development process?

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Other Details

The interview consisted of a 1:1 Interview and a Skills Test.

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Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

3.0

Average Interview

Overall Positive Experience

Received and Declined Offer

Interviewed Sep 2008 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took a day)

I had come across Barclays through milkround.com and decided to apply since it fitted perfectly with my career aspirations. The application took 2 days to complete after which i was invited for the Numerical Reasoning test and Verbal Reasoning. The test was difficult but i managed to get through. Then i was invited for an Assesment day. Where they first gave a presentation about the company and the role. Then we were taken into a room where we are asked to perform a group task, where they see how one interacts with others and how one takes others suggestions. After that a one on one interview was conducted where they asked questions like 1. Why Barclays? 2. Why this role? 3. Where do u see yourself 3 years down the line?4. Competency based questions like how did u react in such a situation?5. What are your salary expectations etc.

Interview Questions

How would you deal with a difficult value investor?

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Other Details

The interview consisted of a 1:1 Interview, a Group/Panel Interview, an IQ/Intelligence Test and a Skills Test.

Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

4.0

Difficult Interview

Overall Positive Experience

Received and Accepted Offer

Interviewed Jan 2009 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took 2 days)

It was all very organized and smooth. The recruitment team was excellent and the interviewers were very friendly and helpful. It didn't feel like a scary environment, where you get nervous that you may not get the offer. The first day, rather evening consisted of a nice reception with drinks and then a proper three course meal with employees from Barcap, some of them, who were the interviewers the following day. After the dinner they told us to have a good night sleep and that we shouldn't be nervous, everything will be fine.
the next day the hole assessment center kicked off with a nice breakfast, then the individual interviews. I had three individual interviews: one technical, one interpersonal and one prioritizing exercise. There was a group exercise combined with a group presentation.
Throughout the day they provided refreshments (tea/coffee, fruits, etc), and there was a very nice filling buffet lunch.
Overall it was an amazing experience, and I am glad that I got the offer!
I would suggest this internship to others!

Interview Questions

What do you think about the credit crunch?

View Answers (1)

Other Details

I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview, a 1:1 Interview, a Group/Panel Interview, a Presentation, a Skills Test and a Background Check.

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Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

4.0

Difficult Interview

Overall Neutral Experience

Interviewed and No Offer

Interviewed Sep 2009 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took 2 weeks)

i was scheduled for a telephonic interview after applying online to a consultant. He asked various questions like expected salary, why are you looking to change etc., The telephonic interview lasted for 40 minutes during which I was asked questions about classes, exceptions, templates, stl, multithreading. I have answered approximately 80% of the questions. Still waiting for the result.

Interview Questions

what are the synchronization techniques?

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Other Details

I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.

More Barclays Capital Software Developer Interviews

Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

3.0

Average Interview

Overall Neutral Experience

Interviewed and No Offer

Interviewed Apr 2009 in London, England (United Kingdom) (took 1 week)

Asked a lot of basic C++ and general programming questions. ie. what is a singleton. what is an exception, constructor, templates, etc. Also asked a lot of brain teaser type questions and optionally to code a solution (with C++ or metacode).