most valuable second language for finance?
native english speaker who is attending a decent uk school (warwick/durham/bath) and am wondering what language is the most feasible and useful to learn for finance
first thought that comes to mind is german, being that it would open doors to DACH, with Zurich being particularly of interest to me.
french as well, but have been told it’s more difficult to reach business level vs. german (would appreciate info) + non native french being looked down upon by employers?
dutch is marketed as the easiest for english speakers but not sure how much that’ll
help me unless i wish to be in amsterdam in (could help with london pe?). no clue on italian/spanish/nordics
have an interesting thought re japanese, as a family friend at a HF in HK expressed that because of the lack of bilingual speakers vs demand for covering japanese equities & growing PE industry there makes candidates who can speak both very attractive. have also heard of stories of people easily getting top jobs in japan after being western educated just because there are few japanese/english speakers applying for the roles, but i assume japanese is quite literally the most difficult language an english speaker could learn
i don’t have an issue immersing myself in any language, it’s more that i want to commit to one and go through with it. i know that everyone here will probably say ‘pick one you like’ but for me i think all of these languages are interesting and appreciate all cultures equally, im just interested in learning the language most useful for my career
any personal experiences and advice is appreciated
The ROI on the time it takes to actually learn a language to full fluency is not great IMO (as someone that learned a second language to Native fluency over the course of 6+ years). Even if you are good with languages/high IQ, it takes years of consistent and dedicated work to get to fully understand and speak not just a language but all of the accompanying cultural factors that make the language worth knowing. IMO it would be better to spend that time reading finance/regular books, networking, working out etc.
Germans almost universally speak English, so there's almost no value add unless you desperately want to live in Frankfurt/Zurich for some reason. Same thing with Dutch and Nordics. If you live in the US, Spanish is very useful but in Europe most Spaniards in finance speak at least functional English bc all cross-border business is conducted in English anyway.
French comes to mind as probably the most useful out of all of them, but then again I think the time would be better spent networking/modeling practice than studying verb conjugations.
bump. avoid italian and southern europe in general. the languages are way too complex, there is NO incentive to go there (unless you enjoy high tax rates and COL) and the locals are almost as snobby as the french when it comes to judging your proficiency in their semi-dead language
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