Swaps, futures, options, structured instruments - a wide range of derivative products is traded in today's financial markets. Analyzing, pricing and managing such products often requires fairly sophisticated quantitative tools and methods. This book serves as an introduction to financial mathematics with special emphasis on aspects relevant in practice. In addition to numerous illustrative examples, algorithmic implementations are demonstrated using "Mathematica" and the software package "UnRisk" (available for both students and teachers). The content is organized in 15 chapters that can be treated as independent modules. In particular, the exposition is tailored for classroom use in a Bachelor or Master program course, as well as for practitioners who wish to further strengthen their quantitative background.

COVERS THE FUNDAMENTAL TOPICS IN MATHEMATICS, STATISTICS, AND FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT THAT ARE REQUIRED FOR A THOROUGH STUDY OF FINANCIAL MARKETS This comprehensive yet accessible book introduces students to financial markets and delves into more advanced material at a steady pace while providing motivating examples, poignant remarks, counterexamples, ideological clashes, and intuitive traps throughout. Tempered by real-life cases and actual market structures, An Introduction to Financial Markets: A Quantitative Approach accentuates theory through quantitative modeling whenever and wherever necessary. It focuses on the lessons learned from timely subject matter such as the impact of the recent subprime mortgage storm, the collapse of LTCM, and the harsh criticism on risk management and innovative finance. The book also provides the necessary foundations in stochastic calculus and optimization, alongside financial modeling concepts that are illustrated with relevant and hands-on examples. An Introduction to Financial Markets: A Quantitative Approach starts with a complete overview of the subject matter. It then moves on to sections covering fixed income assets, equity portfolios, derivatives, and advanced optimization models. This book’s balanced and broad view of the state-of-the-art in financial decision-making helps provide readers with all the background and modeling tools needed to make “honest money” and, in the process, to become a sound professional. Stresses that gut feelings are not always sufficient and that “critical thinking” and real world applications are appropriate when dealing with complex social systems involving multiple players with conflicting incentives Features a related website that contains a solution manual for end-of-chapter problems Written in a modular style for tailored classroom use Bridges a gap for business and engineering students who are familiar with the problems involved, but are less familiar with the methodologies needed to make smart decisions An Introduction to Financial Markets: A Quantitative Approach offers a balance between the need to illustrate mathematics in action and the need to understand the real life context. It is an ideal text for a first course in financial markets or investments for business, economic, statistics, engineering, decision science, and management science students.

Contains lectures presented at the Courant Institute's Mathematical Finance Seminar.

The past twenty years have seen an extraordinary growth in the use of quantitative methods in financial markets. Finance professionals now routinely use sophisticated statistical techniques in portfolio management, proprietary trading, risk management, financial consulting, and securities regulation. This graduate-level textbook is intended for PhD students, advanced MBA students, and industry professionals interested in the econometrics of financial modeling. The book covers the entire spectrum of empirical finance, including: the predictability of asset returns, tests of the Random Walk Hypothesis, the microstructure of securities markets, event analysis, the Capital Asset Pricing Model and the Arbitrage Pricing Theory, the term structure of interest rates, dynamic models of economic equilibrium, and nonlinear financial models such as ARCH, neural networks, statistical fractals, and chaos theory. Each chapter develops statistical techniques within the context of a particular financial application. This exciting new text contains a unique and accessible combination of theory and practice, bringing state-of-the-art statistical techniques to the forefront of financial applications. Each chapter also includes a discussion of recent empirical evidence, for example, the rejection of the Random Walk Hypothesis, as well as problems designed to help readers incorporate what they have read into their own applications.

The quantitative nature of complex financial transactions makes them a fascinating subject area for mathematicians of all types. This book gives an insight into financial engineering while building on introductory probability courses by detailing one of the most fascinating applications of the subject.

This book provides a manual on quantitative financial analysis. Focusing on advanced methods for modelling financial markets in the context of practical financial applications, it will cover data, software and techniques that will enable the reader to implement and interpret quantitative methodologies, specifically for trading and investment. Includes contributions from an international team of academics and quantitative asset managers from Morgan Stanley, Barclays Global Investors, ABN AMRO and Credit Suisse First Boston. Fills the gap for a book on applied quantitative investment & trading models Provides details of how to combine various models to manage and trade a portfolio

Quantitative Methods for Finance and Investments ensures that readers come away from reading it with a reasonable degree of comfort and proficiency in applying elementary mathematics to several types of financial analysis. All of the methodology in this book is geared toward the development, implementation, and analysis of financial models to solve financial problems.

Practice makes perfect. Therefore the best method of mastering models is working with them. This book contains a large collection of exercises and solutions which will help explain the statistics of financial markets. These practical examples are carefully presented and provide computational solutions to specific problems, all of which are calculated using R and Matlab. This study additionally looks at the concept of corresponding Quantlets, the name given to these program codes and which follow the name scheme SFSxyz123. The book is divided into three main parts, in which option pricing, time series analysis and advanced quantitative statistical techniques in finance is thoroughly discussed. The authors have overall successfully created the ideal balance between theoretical presentation and practical challenges.

Written by leading market risk academic, Professor Carol Alexander, Quantitative Methods in Finance forms part one of the Market Risk Analysis four volume set. Starting from the basics, this book helps readers to take the first step towards becoming a properly qualified financial risk manager and asset manager, roles that are currently in huge demand. Accessible to intelligent readers with a moderate understanding of mathematics at high school level or to anyone with a university degree in mathematics, physics or engineering, no prior knowledge of finance is necessary. Instead the emphasis is on understanding ideas rather than on mathematical rigour, meaning that this book offers a fast-track introduction to financial analysis for readers with some quantitative background, highlighting those areas of mathematics that are particularly relevant to solving problems in financial risk management and asset management. Unique to this book is a focus on both continuous and discrete time finance so that Quantitative Methods in Finance is not only about the application of mathematics to finance; it also explains, in very pedagogical terms, how the continuous time and discrete time finance disciplines meet, providing a comprehensive, highly accessible guide which will provide readers with the tools to start applying their knowledge immediately. All together, the Market Risk Analysis four volume set illustrates virtually every concept or formula with a practical, numerical example or a longer, empirical case study. Across all four volumes there are approximately 300 numerical and empirical examples, 400 graphs and figures and 30 case studies many of which are contained in interactive Excel spreadsheets available from the accompanying CD-ROM . Empirical examples and case studies specific to this volume include: Principal component analysis of European equity indices; Calibration of Student t distribution by maximum likelihood; Orthogonal regression and estimation of equity factor models; Simulations of geometric Brownian motion, and of correlated Student t variables; Pricing European and American options with binomial trees, and European options with the Black-Scholes-Merton formula; Cubic spline fitting of yields curves and implied volatilities; Solution of Markowitz problem with no short sales and other constraints; Calculation of risk adjusted performance metrics including generalised Sharpe ratio, omega and kappa indices.

An introduction to modern finance designed for students with strong quantitative skills.