Jacob Brooke

STATUS	Graduating Jul 2026
NEXT	Angel Oak Capital
VENTURE	MRCM Analysts
RESEARCH	Pilot-wave hydrodynamics
EDUCATION	BSc Physics, Bristol
LOCATION	United Kingdom
OPEN TO	Graduate roles, 2026

§ 01

A short introduction

A bit about me, in my own words.

TagsPhysics

—Finance

—Builder

I'm a final-year BSc Physics student at the University of Bristol, predicted a First. For my dissertation, I researched the quantum phenomena of bouncing oil droplets — pilot-wave hydrodynamics. My highest-achieving modules were on the computational side, where I scored 83% in second year and 75% in final year with my project focused on solar power forecasting (discussed below). My research project on pilot-wave hydrodynamics is currently under review for publication.

Outside the lab, I co-founded MRCM Analysts, a data and software consultancy now serving 10 active clients. I've worked across the finance industry — Harwood Capital, Zeus Capital, Shoosmiths — and I'm joining Angel Oak Capital this summer for an internship. After graduating in July 2026, I'm open to a range of graduate roles.

The thread running through everything: take a real problem, find the quantitative shape of it, build something that solves it.

§ 02

Where I've worked

Six roles across investment, law and applied data — building a quantitative and commercial foundation.

May–Jul 2026 Next →

Angel Oak Capital

Investment Mgmt / Credit · $16bn+ AUM · Brookfield-owned

Joining as a summer intern in investment research and credit at a leading US structured-credit specialist. Working across credit analysis, portfolio research and risk in mortgage-backed securities and alternative fixed income. Selected through a competitive process; the role spans both quantitative analysis and qualitative diligence on individual credits.

Nov 2024 → Founder

MRCM Analysts

Co-founder · Data & software consultancy

10 active clients across consumer, fintech and SaaS. End-to-end analytics for PadelStars (50,000 registrations, 50 courts, 12 sites), restructured CrowdProperty's loan tracking (FCA-regulated, ~£1bn), built NTELX's investor pitch (clients incl. FDA / DARPA).

Jul 2025 Investment Banking

Zeus Capital

Equity Research / Corporate Finance

Buy-rated equity research pitch on Big Technologies plc, including a full valuation and investment case; stock has since appreciated ~33% (79p → 105p). Cross-departmental exposure across equity research, corporate finance and sales, gaining a view of how a sell-side investment bank functions end-to-end.

Jul 2024 Private Equity

Harwood Capital

Private & Public Equity · £1.5bn AUM

Screened UK-listed small/mid-caps on cash flow, profitability and balance-sheet criteria, then synthesised public filings, RNS announcements and broker research into investment cases. Built LBO models analysing MOIC returns, produced investment papers with peer benchmarking, and participated in a site visit as part of end-of-fund-life due diligence.

Dec 2024 Corporate Law

Shoosmiths LLP

M&A · Venture capital · Corporate transactions

Supported due diligence and contract review across M&A, venture capital and corporate transactions. Attended client meetings with early-stage startups, developed commercial awareness of deal structuring, and saw how legal advisory wraps around commercial decision-making.

Sep–Dec 2022 Rotational

Burberry

Head Office & Retail · Luxury Brand

Cross-functional rotation across store operations, shop floor, design, HR and finance at a global luxury brand. Developed a working understanding of how the core functions of a major business connect commercially, and how each one contributes to brand and margin.

§ 03

Walking droplets

Final-year BSc research in pilot-wave hydrodynamics. Paper under review for publication.

● Publication under review

Hydrodynamic quantum analogues

Final-year project supervised by Dr. Massimo Antognazzi, investigating silicone-oil droplets that bounce on a vertically vibrated bath and self-propel along their own pilot wave.

These walking droplets (Couder & Fort, 2006) classically reproduce single-slit diffraction, tunnelling and quantised orbits — combining experimental work with Python-based tracking and quantitative analysis.

GitHub → Download paper (PDF) ↓

Bird's-eye view of the experimental apparatus showing the single-slit setup

Bird's-eye view: single-slit apparatus

Walking droplets bouncing on the bath

§ 04

Things I've built

Self-directed and assessed work in machine learning, reinforcement learning and fintech.

i Machine Learning

Solar Power Forecasting

Multi-site PV forecasting system on a Hong Kong dataset with integrated meteorology. Compared Linear / Ridge / Lasso / Tree / MLP models with feature engineering and lag variables.

Python scikit-learn RMSE/MAE

GitHub (soon) →

ii Fullstack · In Progress

Lab Notebook

A cumulative, replayable digital lab notebook for Bristol physics undergraduates. Words, data and photos in the order they happened — exportable as a polished PDF, shareable to demonstrators as a read-only link that grows session by session. AI cleans up spelling and units; never authors.

Next.js React Supabase

GitHub →

iii Reinforcement Learning

AI Trading System

Prototype RL trader on BTC/ETH 1h candles using stable-baselines3 (PPO + LSTM). Exploring signal design, backtesting and risk controls in noisy real-world data.

PPO LSTM SB3

GitHub (soon) →

iv Fintech

Budgeting & Banking Tool

Personal budgeting tool integrating TrueLayer for live bank-account connectivity. Auto-categorises expenditure and tracks spending against budgets.

TrueLayer Python Automation

GitHub (soon) →

§ 05

How I work

A quantitative toolkit, a commercial toolkit, and the things outside both.

Programming

Python
SQL
Power BI
Excel (advanced)

Quantitative

Supervised learning
Neural networks
Monte Carlo
Linear algebra

Commercial

Financial modelling
LBO & valuation
Equity research
Investor pitches

§ 06

Beyond work

The other stuff — guitar, theatre, sport, and the places I've spent time.

Off-hours

Sport · Music
Theatre · Travel

Tennis and padel are my main sports. I was Social Secretary for the University of Bristol Tennis Club — the largest sports club on campus — hosting events for over 100 people in my second year. I'm currently part of the Bristol Padel League, placing top 3 with my partner. I also play squash and ski / snowboard when I can.

I play acoustic and electric guitar (Grade 5, fingerpicking, partial to blues), played lead in the school production of Shakespeare in Love, and was a Platoon Leader in the CCF.

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Jacob
Brooke/

A short introduction