Search results

  1. doug reich

    Finding Quant Job in Boston, a New Yorker Story

    Most of the NY folks I have associated with are desperate to work, work hard, and make lots of money. They want to pretend they're five years older and more important than they really are. (Not a value judgment, just saying). Boston folks are generally more laid back and perhaps less ambitious...
  2. doug reich

    Finding Quant Job in Boston, a New Yorker Story

    If New York Is the Capital of Finance, there are lots of provincial towns... A very quick bit of background. I entered the Baruch MFE in Fall 2008 as a full-time student, while continuing to do work for my previous employer. When my summer internship search was unfruitful, I negotiated some...
  3. doug reich

    Bloomberg API for requesting quotes/trading bonds

    Press "help help" and/or talk to your bloomberg rep.
  4. doug reich

    Master list of free financial data

    From Abnormal Returns blog yesterday: Free Historical Data Sources Engineering Targeted Returns and Risk
  5. doug reich

    Help!!! Java business/trading days calendar library

    I wrote something up in R that does it based on the datetime library - you might see where they're getting their data/write an API/create a list of dates from long in the past or on into the future and import it once. Email me if you want what I did.
  6. doug reich

    So how much does a master's GPA matter?

    I agree with Adam. However, the other important factor is your presentation. From two years on this forum and meeting you personally, you may want to work on your presentation.
  7. doug reich

    Would you attend Baruch MFE or Columbia MFE?

    Stevens, have you attended either program? I am finishing up at Baruch. I have spoken to people at Columbia and NYU and from what I can tell, the job prospects in a down market such as this one (which seems to thankfully be abating somewhat) are the same at all three places. In boom times, name...
  8. doug reich

    questions on bond

    1. You want to use the 3yr and 5yr bonds to back out a rate curve. This is partly done with a model for what the rates are at 1 yr, 2 yr, etc. for which you do not have data. You then use those rates to discount the coupon payments to get the price. 2. The spread is defined as the market's...
  9. doug reich

    Article: High-Frequency Trading Firms Seeking Tech Talent

    To build that sentiment, it doesn't make sense to get excited every time one corner of the business tells you one thing and the other tells you another. Are you on the CFA forums fretting about your lack of accounting knowledge? The best course of action for you or anyone else is to educate...
  10. doug reich

    Ubuntu

    Let me google that for you Yes, but you don't get any journaling.
  11. doug reich

    R vs. Matlab speed comparison

    First hit in google, anyway. :) Thanks.
  12. doug reich

    R vs. Matlab speed comparison

    I recall seeing posts on R vs Matlab in speed a few months back. Can anyone find them? Does anyone else recall this? I think Shlomi had the good links I am looking for - too bad he posts so often! Does anyone else find the search feature on here kind of useless these days?
  13. doug reich

    Wall Street Smarts - NY Times article

    It's too bad you stopped reading "Liar's Poker" at the third sentence, because right after that Michael Lewis explains how Ranieri's vision is made possible only by hiring people who knew the math, because he didn't by his own admission.
  14. doug reich

    Recruiters are calling, but...

    Luckily there's hundreds of posts on quantnet that say that.
  15. doug reich

    Recruiters are calling, but...

    There are very fancy places that think this way. A. The PhD is over-qualified. B. The PhD is asking for too much money. C. The PhD's ego is getting in the way. D. Firms like to mold their candidates, and a highly-educated or highly-experienced person may be too set in his ways. See prior...
  16. doug reich

    Recruiters are calling, but...

    Ilya, you're asking for the same advice over and over again and hoping for a different answer each time. There's saying about that...
  17. doug reich

    Quantnet Picnic RSVP

    Andy, thanks for posting the pictures. You have the location mistaken, however. We were not on the "Great Law". It was actually the "Great Hill", but the mistake is a common one. :)
  18. doug reich

    Quantnet Picnic RSVP

    User CP -> Networking -> Pictures and Albums Add a link here when you've created it. Also, thanks to Mathew, Aditya, Vladimir for your help!
  19. doug reich

    Quantnet Picnic RSVP

    Please volunteer to bring some of the following: * blankets to sit on * sporting equipment, i.e. soccer ball, football, baseball * Several coolers (we will supply the ice and the drinks) See you all on Sunday!
  20. doug reich

    Where can I get historical gold prices?

    So go to subotnick center and use their bloomberg. Or, write a script to pull the prices on that website Eugene linked. It should be pretty easy (look at the urls!)
  21. doug reich

    Better to have IB internship OR solid experience at Fortune 500?

    Again, a relevant internship is going to look better than an irrelevant job. It's not about the size of the company, you should also think about whether there are any transferable skills. Prospective employers understand you are capable of working, so you don't need to prove that by holding a...
  22. doug reich

    Quantnet Picnic RSVP

    I figure this requires a bump just to make sure people see it. Quant Network - Financial Engineering Forum The picnic will be a week from Sunday, September 20, on the Great Hill in Central Park. Please RSVP by Wednesday so we know how much food to get. You are, of course, welcome to bring your...
  23. doug reich

    Better to have IB internship OR solid experience at Fortune 500?

    Are you asking us to choose between a more relevant or less relevant internship? More relevant is better. Having unrelated experience to what you want to do will not help you much, and it may make it harder in some cases.
  24. doug reich

    2009 Quantnet Central Park Picnic

    We'll be posting some other items to bring this weekend. If you'd like to volunteer to purchase food and bring to the day of, please contact me. The school will be paying for it, we just need to get a bunch of stuff. It'll be easier if you have a car to move things, as well.
  25. doug reich

    2009 Quantnet Central Park Picnic

    See the following RSVP for the details. Quantnet.com - Financial Engineering Forum
  26. doug reich

    2009 Quantnet Central Park Picnic

    We're going ahead with 9/20.
  27. doug reich

    Moving Beta

    You choices are valid, just try them out and figure out a metric (e.g. performance of some strategy) to optimize them over. To compute them, look up the Linest function in excel, if that's where you're working. Or, look up the explicit formula for linear regression coefficients and use that...
  28. doug reich

    2009 Quantnet Central Park Picnic

    I haven't gone in forever, but wouldn't really be suitable for the picnic as there is not so much open space. Also, it's more like 7 stops into Queens at Astoria Blvd if we're talking about the same place.
  29. doug reich

    Ubuntu

    I was windows-free for a long time, but then I needed office, so I was back on Windows for a while. I tried using Open Office a few minutes ago and was disgusted. I am running 32-bit Ubuntu on a 64-bit machine because no one has ever explained the advantages of using 64-bit to me. The downsides...
  30. doug reich

    Perception: something to think about

    I wouldn't even draw those conclusions. As a "social experiment" all it tells you is that people compartmentalize. In the subway, they are in transit, not looking to listen to music that requires your undivided attention for long periods of time. I certainly have noticed beautiful music in the...
  31. doug reich

    Feedback on VBA Forms for Microsoft

    You probably see this either because people are lazy, and don't want to bother designing forms or, equally likely, they switch interfaces depending on the inadequacies of one or the other. I definitely do both.
  32. doug reich

    Pay to get internships

    Supply and demand. I think this was in the WSJ a few months back as well.
  33. doug reich

    Stochastic in Stock Chart

    Looking at your original post for probably the third time, I still don't know what you're giving us. Are those open/high/low/close numbers at the bottom? Is our goal to get the MRCB number you posted? Can you provide additional information?
  34. doug reich

    The Master Happy Birthday thread

    In defense of the modern youth who grew up on this stuff, most people I know do plenty of reading. It's not clear to me that the average person ever wrote things deeper or better composed than a letter. You can romanticize the medium if you like, but I don't think there's a "good old days" of...
  35. doug reich

    Advice for Ph.D student in Finance

    Please read the myriad other posts on "what should I do". Look at the recommended reading. Be more specific. Those three things will get you a real response to your question.
  36. doug reich

    Star trader threatens to leave Citi

    Isn't Wall Street great? His initial bet would have been much smaller if he wasn't very confident in it. And if it was wrong it would have been cut sooner as well, I think.
  37. doug reich

    Rubenstein, Unscrambling the binary code, 1991

    Only because they take d=0; this is a more general case.
  38. doug reich

    ArsTechnica: Algo trading overview

    ...and say hello? His contact information, like everyone else in the college, is available to the public, so contact away.
  39. doug reich

    What features would you like to see on Quantnet ?

    I agree - the box is extremely annoying. It reminds me of the search box that comes up when you highlight something on the New York Times website -- I use adblock to keep that thing out of my life.
  40. doug reich

    The Master Happy Birthday thread

    After being raised by wolves. :) THanks to all who have and will wish me a happy birthday :)
  41. doug reich

    The Master Happy Birthday thread

    There's a parable about the boy who cries "wolf" to get attention, but nobody will come running when an actual wolf comes. Commit my birthday to memory, because I think it will disappear from facebook forever...
  42. doug reich

    NYT Article: Traders Profit With Computers Set at High Speed

    I actually think it's a valid objection. What real purpose are these people playing the market? The liquidity they provide is comparable to the "protection" the mafia provide, and you're better off without.
  43. doug reich

    What features would you like to see on Quantnet ?

    and Firefox, as well?
  44. doug reich

    NYT Article: Traders Profit With Computers Set at High Speed

    Most of what you disagree with is commonly referred to as "nitpicking". Although most of the statements in the article are universal, if you qualify them with some "many"s or "some"s, then you might actually come to agree with it.
  45. doug reich

    What features would you like to see on Quantnet ?

    I have neither an iphone nor a blackberry, and my desktop computer simply cannot be accused of being "mobile", but all I see is the mobile skin. On the other hand, I won't visit the forums if this skin stays this way, so this could be a big productivity booster.
  46. doug reich

    Math Subject GREs

    Is that a joke? Read the thousands of words people have written to you in the last year: go out and bust your *** at what you're good at. If you're not good at anything, then learn something and get good at it. Second Andy: Gold plated degrees only get you as far as the front door. Just...
  47. doug reich

    Using C# in Excel

    Why doesn't MS understand that extensibility is the way of the future? Fielding retail software that is completely closed or practically so (when you can't actually distribute your software in a way people will understand, that's not "open"), is just giving people more reasons to get out!
  48. doug reich

    How to get a hedge fund job

    Don't worry, they don't hire undergrads either. You can't have it both ways - either you are going to the street, or you are at the top of your field and can get "invited" to work at the funds like Renaissance you idolize so much.
  49. doug reich

    How to get a hedge fund job

    Seriously Cartman, loads immediately for me.;) Maybe you shouldn't shop for other jobs while at work, and these things won't be blocked. :)
  50. doug reich

    How to get a hedge fund job

    Just came across this while searching for something else (I swear!). So far not a lot there, but I can see so far it's quality stuff. Not specifically quant, but definitely not hurting to follow what he says. How to get a Hedge Fund Job
  51. doug reich

    Interesting observation about Price and Volume

    Umm, they cherry picked panic days. Those are almost by definition both down days and high volume days. What about non-extreme events?
  52. doug reich

    Math Subject GREs

    I would guess you're screwed. Caveat: I never took it, but the many people I know who took at my school it did not think it was hard, but it definitely required a lot of the courses they took. Lucky for you, it is all the lower-level stuff, not the junior and senior year courses they took as...
  53. doug reich

    Job market in NYC for international students

    There are two "algo trading" definitions. I recall one defined as the "Chicago style" and one the "New York style" (not to be confused with pizzas). Almgren studies New York -- trading client orders to minimize error from a benchmark. The big bucks are in Chicago style -- coming up with...
  54. doug reich

    Job market in NYC for international students

    Netflix Prize: View Leaderboard - I think you have 30 days from their first post of 10%+ to beat them, so it is still technically ongoing. But given the lifetime of this competition, it would be quite the upset to beat them with the days counting down. EDIT: Wikipedia says there are 5 days left...
  55. doug reich

    Job market in NYC for international students

    I hope you stopped, since someone has won.
  56. doug reich

    what information to include in the resume

    There is most certainly an unwritten law. If I can't trust you to write down the most basic facts of your history (recent history!), how can I possibly expect you to do good work? That should get someone riled up... Seriously, you are going to be in an interview and either have to continue...
  57. doug reich

    what information to include in the resume

    If that's what you've been doing the last 5 years, excluding them will only be disingenuous. You don't really have a choice. It will definitely look confused unless you somehow incorporate your reasoning, probably in the cover letter.
  58. doug reich

    Functional Languages

    Pass-by-value a functional language does not make. I haven't used matlab lately, but my recollection is that it doesn't do list transformations nor function composition and lambda functions. Those are necessary components of functional languages. R is very functional, which has brought my great...
  59. doug reich

    A provocative discussion of Goldman Sachs

    Yes, it's one of the few articles I've read on the subject that doesn't moralize about CDOs and whether you should make big bonuses while contributing little to society. The point is that the system is unchanged, the survivors uncowed, and the next bubble queued up.
  60. doug reich

    Unemployed finance guys in Buenos Aires

    I wish you had mentioned that so I could have saved my time - the article went nowhere fast.
  61. doug reich

    Pricing STRIPS

    Is this more complicated than discounting using the appropriate rate curve? Wherever you are working, you should be able to get such a curve.
  62. doug reich

    A provocative discussion of Goldman Sachs

    Goldman Sachs Attn: Bonus Request 85 Broad Street New York, NY 10004 It's right there in the picture from the article Andy linked.
  63. doug reich

    A provocative discussion of Goldman Sachs

    Very astute. Most people are extremely low ambition and want nothing more than a hole in the ground to sit in. The average person will accept a dull stick and dig himself a hole. Maybe two holes.
  64. doug reich

    What features would you like to see on Quantnet ?

    I'm not so sure about your reasoning (without reading the copyright law). This is a public forum, so anyone with an internet connection can get the files we put here. Not every member even is a student, nor do those people necessarily have access to the papers; if they do, they are probably...
  65. doug reich

    GS trading source code stolen

    Giving them the benefit of the doubt, isn't there an obvious way you could manipulate markets if you had the biggest player's playbook? That is, GS could be using it appropriately just to do trading, but if someone else had the software, they would know what GS does and could front run them and...
  66. doug reich

    Entry Level Quant Roles available

    Not with that attitude.
  67. doug reich

    King of Pop Michael Jackson has died

    Is that what that is? All along I thought he was playing us, and was in fact a huge MJ fan!
  68. doug reich

    GS trading source code stolen

    Yes, thank you. If it wasn't clear who the complainant was, it is now completely obvious. What other major financial institution with a wide variety of products whose dominance is contingent on proprietary technology gave Aleynikov a key card and a log in? What if Aleynikov had worked in the...
  69. doug reich

    From McNamara to the quants of today

    My understanding is that "modern" business, which was made up of lots of estimates previously, came about after the second world war. Prior to that, many companies and governments didn't have a budget; they kind of hand waved and when things came up short they would issue some bonds and swear to...
  70. doug reich

    Happy Independence Day!

    How does being in the land of the midnight sun help your early-to-bed habits? I see the Bergen, Norway currently has dusk at 12:39 AM and dawn at 2:44 AM. Contrary to woody's remark, it is one of the brightest days, physically speaking. Bergen, Norway - Sunrise, sunset, dawn and dusk times for...
  71. doug reich

    Ideas for MSFE Graduation Papers/Projects

    Study markets. Do you have any interests you would like to help direct people?
  72. doug reich

    What features would you like to see on Quantnet ?

    I don't. Where can I turn it off?
  73. doug reich

    Informercial King Billy Mays-50 found dead

    The gumment is creating outrage so they can pass radical legislation! Conspiracy!
  74. doug reich

    Which Linux distribution should I install?

    That's very true. I did that with a few distros recently and still came up with ubuntu. I think the most important thing in Linux distros (in no particular order) is a. hardware recognition b. package distribution I don't think anyone has better package management than Ubuntu. Obviously, very...
  75. doug reich

    Which Linux distribution should I install?

    Ubuntu. It's the most polished distro out there.
  76. doug reich

    Dialogue with Microsoft VBA Excel team

    Sure you can - Control+Break. It won't break out of a compiled excel function, but once any of those functions finish, you will see the Debug message and you can hit "End".
  77. doug reich

    Dialogue with Microsoft VBA Excel team

    Another thing I recall as a major pet peeve: moving data around worksheets. If I want to copy a single value from one cell to another, it's easy: ' If cellRange1 and cellRange2 are valid Range variables cellRange1.Value = cellRange2.Value If I want to set a range of cells equal to an array...
  78. doug reich

    What classes do you plan to take next semester ?

    Where did you find that? I could only seem to find descriptions for the undergraduate courses. What is 9700 and 9000?
  79. doug reich

    What classes do you plan to take next semester ?

    Stats 9701 is Time Series Forecasting. I believe it is this course that was highly recommended by some of the earlier students. I would definitely like to take it, schedule-willing.
  80. doug reich

    Dialogue with Microsoft VBA Excel team

    A few things off the top of my head. 1. Threading. Now that the calculation engine for excel is threaded, VBA feels like a sucker for not allowing it. And I could get a big speed up that way. (For those haters out there, yes, I am also working on code in a "real" language. But in actuality, you...
  81. doug reich

    R Trade Simulation?

    Look at this page, there is a repo of R finance libraries. There are a few on backtesting - still evaluating them. http://cran.r-project.org/web/views/Finance.html
  82. doug reich

    Ultrathin laptop from the Thinkpad family

    I'll trade your iTouch for a $25 Canadian iTunes card.
  83. doug reich

    Is programming knowledge a requirement for MFE grads ?

    Those depend. If you need to learn C++ syntax, you need a reference type book to go over it, e.g. Absolute C++. Once you have that down, it's all about style and applications - spring for a finance one. As I have heard over and over again, to call yourself a C++ programmer you have to use object...
  84. doug reich

    R Trade Simulation?

    equities
  85. doug reich

    R Trade Simulation?

    It may be possible to manipulate, but the doc make backtest seem like a pretty unsophisticated tool. If there's anything I've learned in this project so far, don't ever compute from daily returns; always compute your cost basis and capital evolution curve in "real" dollars and back out percent...
  86. doug reich

    R Trade Simulation?

    There seem to be a few projects out there, all under heavy development, which assist in trade simulation. In particular, I'm looking for something where I can give it tickers, and the trades made, and when, and it will track my capital and PnL. Preferably it will also allocate capital so I can...
  87. doug reich

    An invention that could change the internet for ever

    I don't think there's a new engine per-se, but more improvements being added to google to keep Bing from gaining market share. It's not clear why this is news, however. ::further snide comments hidden::
  88. doug reich

    Is programming knowledge a requirement for MFE grads ?

    Pick up a book and download a compiler and start playing. Go to the "master reading list for MFE" on this site for suggested books. If you haven't programmed before, it will be hard.
  89. doug reich

    CDO Insurance?

    I think he's describing mortgage insurance (look it up) and its effect on mortgage pool payments/CDO prices. From what I read online about mortgage insurance, it will have almost no effect on CDOs: although it is only ever used for "risky" mortgages, our risky mortgages of the last two years...
  90. doug reich

    With Finance Disgraced, Which Career Will Be King?

    To nitpick: Brooklyn Tech. There are a number of other "specialized high schools", but they do not target science, rather those gifted in arts, etc.
  91. doug reich

    Monte Carlo simulation of instantaneous spot rate

    2. Try using more paths. 3. Yes. They are not much more code, give them a try.
  92. doug reich

    Linux users?

    Try adding that to your login .bashrc (or whatever) so you get more uniform behavior. If you google for this problem, you will find that it's a really stupid annoying thing that once you put the right commands in your login script should go away. It depends. Sometime systems will have different...
  93. doug reich

    Random numbers in Monte Carlo simulation

    There's nothing wrong with that way. However, since your end goal is to get a better price for your contract, and not to get a single random outcome for the contract, there is a better method. That method is to use non-random, i.e. Low-discrepancy, numbers. These are "random" numbers designed to...
  94. doug reich

    R: anderson-darling test

    I had forgotten about that! Unfortunately, I don't see the link Bob posted there (documenting the adk test function), so one must refine one's search terms.
  95. doug reich

    R: anderson-darling test

    It's been a fun game so far, but perhaps the moral of the story is "do your research".
  96. doug reich

    R: anderson-darling test

    Did you type that into google? http://www.google.com/search?q=r+anderson+darling+test&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a http://pbil.univ-lyon1.fr/library/nortest/html/ad.test.html
  97. doug reich

    End of Semester Bonanza

    Unlike you, I am old enough to forget details such as "names". When you turn 21 you can give it a try.
  98. doug reich

    End of Semester Bonanza

    Yes, I think we can plan on Alpine, and if that doesn't work, Globe, I suppose.
  99. doug reich

    Need your feedback

    Looking at the bottom of your post, can you be more specific on your goals after MFE program? You seem to want to continue in a technical role; will this degree really help you there? People usually aim to be closer to the money, not to get more money staying at the same distance. :)
  100. doug reich

    Need your feedback

    I don't see anywhere in your post -- I assume you are applying to an MFE? I think your work experience sounds fine. Just don't be shy in talking about it in your personal statement and have those writing letters of rec emphasize your financial knowledge. I don't think GRE verbal counts heavily...
  101. doug reich

    What features would you like to see on Quantnet ?

    Question: why do live search and regular search differ so much? Live search seems to be better, perhaps we can use that one instead.
  102. doug reich

    Linux users?

    I wouldn't agree with that. I definitely miss the incredibly powerful conversion, filesystem, and text software. You want to print to PDF? Edit PDF? Link PDFs? Convert .ps to .pdf because someone else loves PS and you hate it? Those are one-liners. In windows, I have NEVER seen a program that...
  103. doug reich

    Release mode vs debug mode

    Doubt it. Aditya, I have had the same problem. The OS can be inconsistent as to how it handles that kind of error, it seems. I think if I wrote past the end of C-style arrays I would get one incarnation, and if I wrote past the end of C++ vectors I would get another. Try going to the build...
  104. doug reich

    Linux users?

    Not all of us have written books on debugging in unix. Otherwise, I agree wholeheartedly; I can code at least twice as fast on Linux using Emacs, grep, sed, etc. than I can in Windows. However, I never learned project management, makefiles (I knew a little once but definitely forget), or the...
  105. doug reich

    Social Security & Medicare

    Both interesting points... except that the social safety net is so weak that you'd have to be crazy to do nothing and collect unemployment instead of working and earning money. And really, taxes are nowhere near the point when people stop working because they don't reap the benefit. I believe...
  106. doug reich

    Social Security & Medicare

    .... because it's a transfer payment?
  107. doug reich

    FIX technology

    It's an IT tool. The real nitty-gritty of the trading systems uses FIX. However, these days it's better if you can do more, not less. In general, there are many paths to success. Given your hatred of programming, FIX will be a tough pill to swallow.
  108. doug reich

    Linux users?

    I used to... are you asking about code or about life in general? :)
  109. doug reich

    When Really Big Numbers Aren't Nearly Enough

    Techies and tech blogs have been forecasting for a while when the last IP address will be assigned (but I can't seem to find the article right now). Ars Technica has an article on IPV6 that looks very interesting http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2007/03/IPv6.ars See also XKCD
  110. doug reich

    When does a tranche become worthless in a CDO?

    The waterfall is paid from most to least senior, so equity is always paid last. Each tranche receives interest due, and then they receive principle due (normally, as Maxrum says it can be done any way they feel like). However, equity may get paid out before other tranches are receiving principle...
  111. doug reich

    An invention that could change the internet for ever

    If I had a spot in the all-you-can-eat dessert, I would not want to share. Chuck Norris can make dessert just by thinking about it. I agree with Stefan: I'll believe it when I see it.
  112. doug reich

    "MFE program profile evaluation" master thread

    You're probably right, although I thought if you finish the section and have extra time you can go back over questions. I also took this over a year ago and had a lot of other stuff going on, so my memory is quite suspect.
  113. doug reich

    "MFE program profile evaluation" master thread

    I think once you finish the section you can go back to any prior question. Just write down the ones you skipped. In fact, go to the GRE website and download their practice software. It's ugly and kludgey but it's identical to what yo uget in the testing center, so you can familiarize yourself...
  114. doug reich

    Future of credit raters

    Off the top of my head, have the rating agency paid from the cashflow of the security. If it's a good one, they'll be willing to be further down in the waterfall (capital structure for a bond). For the real trash, they will either need to be paid immediately or they will refuse to rate it. And...
  115. doug reich

    Excel spreadsheet problem

    It is happening because excel is importing your columns as text for some reason. This generally happens when the number field being imported has a space in it.
  116. doug reich

    Future of credit raters

    Rating agencies are not moot by any stretch, and for two reasons. 1. They have privileged information. They get to look at the books, the individual loans, whatever. I as an investor may be lazy and use them because I can't rate every deal myself (all laziness is relative), but even if I...
  117. doug reich

    Request to Administartors /Moderators or whatever...

    When you write the same thing over and over again, perhaps you will understand. The person who frequents a chat board and responds to those (and these!) types of posts is prone to obsession. They want to increase knowledge in the world, yet the damn world will never learn!
  118. doug reich

    Request to Administartors /Moderators or whatever...

    I don't agree that people are being somehow mistreated on the forum. There are many, many threads on what you can expect in this industry, in school, etc. Many people post without showing that they have done any research, and ask questions the indicate as much. I don't recall your specific...
  119. doug reich

    Excel spreadsheet problem

    Data -> Text to Columns will also help.
  120. doug reich

    Bank Takeovers Deepened Financial Market Crisis

    That's not an accurate metaphor. It's more like trying to reengineer your car mid-race or even mid-crash to be safer. It's a sorry situation, but irrelevant and not worth discussing. Right now, we're stuck with a few mega-banks, and we can break them up when they can stand to be broken. Perhaps...
  121. doug reich

    Non-quant background question

    Look at Baruch introductions for an idea of peoples' backgrounds. You need a strong math background, finance will be learned.
  122. doug reich

    COMPARE School (NYU or Rutgers) or work????

    That's a loaded question. Read the many, many posts on this forum on that subject.
  123. doug reich

    US Open

    If you're interested in attending the US open at the beginning of September, early ticket sales begin April 18, and general public begins June 6. If you're interested in attending as a group, give a ping here or in my PM, and we can coordinate something; we might even get a group rate. For...
  124. doug reich

    Help: calibrate Hull-White model

    Definitely ask the help desk -- that's the kind of question they can answer. Press "help" twice. Also try "Related functions" at the top of the screen. Also try typing in your search terms and waiting for the drop down OR hit the "Help" button in the upper right corner and explore the results...
  125. doug reich

    When all else fails...

    American Dream = price American options following a random mouse walk?
  126. doug reich

    hardest question I got in an interview!

    "Find x" "<-- here it is" No, they mean what is the expected value of the maximum.
  127. doug reich

    The Master Happy Birthday thread

    Happy birthday! (better add some dancing bananas for good measure) :dance::dance::dance::dance:
  128. doug reich

    Excel guru required for assistance - I am losing my sanity

    So what you want to do now is look at the equity growth of each property as a function of different capital growths, etc? Seems like the best way is to recompute the table for a range of input values, e.g. capital growth rate from 0% to 20%, and save the output values in a table so you have...
  129. doug reich

    Excel guru required for assistance - I am losing my sanity

    Yes, definitely give us something to look at. Can you work out all the figures by hand? I think so, because you did it in the long description you gave. Therefore to do what you want to do, just encode each of those calculations in a cell referencing prior cells in a spreadsheet. Put all...
  130. doug reich

    Interesting presentation

    Very good talk as an introduction to ocaml. Definitely listen around minute 37 and 59 for interesting discussion of features (you may have to go back a little -- this person summarized them in the comments ). Or watch the whole thing. I like how I was doing the horrible boilerplating in my C++...
  131. doug reich

    A.I.G. Lists the Banks to Which It Paid Rescue Funds

    Why is this news? The whole reason they were bailed out was because they were counterparty to many other institutions. Is this the newspaper and lawmakers being clueless or worse, or is there more to this situation than is getting reported...
  132. doug reich

    tools for analysis of time series against a financial value

    You can use the EQS function to do that in Bloomberg. There are other products that let you backtest that type of strategy. Basically, you need access to historical fundamental and pricing data; there is a nontrivial problem that either you or they have to deal with called survivorship bias...
  133. doug reich

    Baruch MFE Baruch goes to Canada

    This is me & Shlomi rocking the commodities case. And my contribution to the "traders with hands on faces" corpus: ... not that I was the only one with such pictures...
  134. doug reich

    COMPARE Financial Engineering vs Quantitative Finance vs Mathematics in Finance

    I can't say, but you should search these forums (also use the tag cloud) as those programs you mentioned are frequent topics here.
  135. doug reich

    COMPARE Financial Engineering vs Quantitative Finance vs Mathematics in Finance

    I recall being confused about the differences in the programs as well. It helps to compare the courses offered to see what the actual differences are (they should all have a stochastic calculus series, for example, and so that won't contribute to your decision). Once you know what each one does...
  136. doug reich

    Python

    I know a whole bunch of people interested in learning python. I think the best way is follow the tutorial on the python website to get the basics (The Python Tutorial &mdash; Python v2.6.1 documentation) and then just start playing, and search for what you don't know. This XKCD comic pretty much...
  137. doug reich

    Random computer question

    If you go to run and type "msconfig" you can change what gets started on boot. Try disabling some things there to see if the problem goes away. Maybe someone played a mean trick on you and made the bootup sound five minutes of silence followed by an error beep.
  138. doug reich

    hedging a interest rate rise

    If anybody will execute those trades, it is a full service broker, e.g. at an investment bank.
  139. doug reich

    Has someone read the book "An Introduction to High-Frequency Finance"?

    This begs the question, what would you suggest as a general high frequency text?
  140. doug reich

    MBA Graduate Seeking FE Advice

    NYU has a FE certificate program. You can also attend the program part-time, perhaps cherry-picking the classes you want (if you clear it with the powers that be). The question is: what do you want from the degree?
  141. doug reich

    Confusion regarding MBA or QFE!

    There is the desire and the reality. There are far more people requesting PhDs than there are actual, living PhDs. Many of those jobs will be filled by lesser mortals, including those with Masters. I don't have the answer, but contrast this question with that in your previous post; those with...
  142. doug reich

    Confusion regarding MBA or QFE!

    That is correct. That can happen. There are myriad examples, including posts by user dhride on this forum recently, or famous people include Ken Griffin of Citadel. Most of us are not clever enough, lucky enough, or entrepreneurial enough to do that. Fortunately, there is a big industry with...
  143. doug reich

    The Master Happy Birthday thread

    Thanks everyone! I am 23, and 7 months today!
  144. doug reich

    Resizing a Vector Throws a bad_alloc

    My recollection is that those are all the same symptoms of out of bounds problems. Nightmares, indeed.
  145. doug reich

    Resizing a Vector Throws a bad_alloc

    To clarify what I said earlier, if you access data out of array bounds, you may not see the error until the array is deconstructed or another memory operation occurs. (Don't I know from debugging my matrix class)
  146. doug reich

    Resizing a Vector Throws a bad_alloc

    What about the memory access above there? I believe bad_alloc is usually thrown when you try to do memory operations AFTER a violation has already occurred. So you should look higher up in your program for bad memory operations.
  147. doug reich

    2007 ACM Collegiate Programming Contest Problems

    Since you have a stronger background in this than I do, I'm going to assume I didn't think through the problems enough. (bin packing, I was thinking of the container ship problem; graphics, there were few, I was specifically thinking of ray tracing re: the roofing problem; the blood type one...
  148. doug reich

    hedging a interest rate rise

    Different investment banks make markets in these OTC contracts; you would talk to your broker, who would know. They probably wouldn't work with an individual; they trade in large notional amounts.
  149. doug reich

    Sledding and hot chocolate!

    0 users found that helpful; you can sled the whole way there.
  150. doug reich

    Sledding and hot chocolate!

    If you can be torn away from your C++ and stochastic calculus for a bit, you might consider the parks department offer of sledding and hot chocolate: Parks Department Offering Free Hot Chocolate, Sledding Today! - Gothamist: New York City News, Food, Arts & Events
  151. doug reich

    Senate approves restriction on foreign hires by banks receiving bailout

    It's not about logic; it's about culture wars. The concept that you can really measure "job displacement" is designed around manufacturing, not the information economy; every candidate is different in education and experience, let alone soft skills that are not measured. There are a lot of...
  152. doug reich

    2007 ACM Collegiate Programming Contest Problems

    I agree it is definitely a different type of exam than, say, the Putnam (Putnam Directory). However, if the solution to a problem (e.g. bin packing or graphics rendering) is taught to all CS majors who comprise the competition, where is the challenge? Is it a programming or a computer science...
  153. doug reich

    2007 ACM Collegiate Programming Contest Problems

    The competition does not seem that hard; just unpleasant. A number are well-known problems covered in an algorithms class (I should know; I took one), and are mainly about the programming of those algorithms.
  154. doug reich

    The short & simple story of the credit crisis

    It reminds me of the futurama video about the great garbage crisis of the 21st century. "'Back in my day, you could only download porn on the internet.' 'That's still true.'" Neat video, but they kind of skipped all the important stuff at the end, and exaggerated a lot of stuff at the beginning...
  155. doug reich

    Baruch MFE Baruch goes to Canada

    Incidentally, there are quite a few trading competitions around. Just when we were in Canada, one at the NYMEX was mentioned, another online that had just expired (not IB), one in Michigan. It could be worthwhile looking at the whole list that's out there.
  156. doug reich

    VBA BOOK/EXCERCISES

    There's one or two here: Master reading list for MFE - QuantNetwork - Financial Engineering Forum
  157. doug reich

    Simons's Medallion Fund up 80% in 2008

    We're all happy your faith in Simons is unshaken.
  158. doug reich

    Financial Modeling with MATLAB at Baruch College, Mar 4

    Financial Modeling with MATLAB at Baruch College 04 Mar 2009 12:45 p.m. to 2:15 p.m. Baruch College, Zicklin School of Business, Room VC10-215 Who Should Attend Faculty Students Researchers Register for this free seminar...
  159. doug reich

    Simons's Medallion Fund up 80% in 2008

    Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
  160. doug reich

    Vertical Roll Spreading

    I don't have a terminal to play with, but it looks like it is only looking at the options expiration dates. Try changing the Evaluation dates on the second screen to be, say, tomorrow and see what happens. You might also try Help-Help to ask the help(less) desk.
  161. doug reich

    Visa Restrictions

    See this page for what you get for your citizenship: Henley & Partners -*International Visa Restrictions It seems being in the developed countries of Europe, US, and far east get you comparable access to the globe. Anywhere else and all bets are off. (The countries at the bottom of the list...
  162. doug reich

    Quant Market

    "Bern in hell?" That one was stretching it a little. I think what makes things difficult to see a way out for quants as opposed to MBAs who are competing for analyst jobs is that there is an 90-year-old path for MBA-types into banks; the quant track is 20 years old and has never suffered this...
  163. doug reich

    Is New York over the hill?

    Also, since I am very near the end of The Power Broker, I appreciate its thesis that Robert Moses played a big role in the decline of New York as a livable city (and, through his leadership, other cities as well) by fostering ghettoization and crushing mass transit projects. I find this a more...
  164. doug reich

    Is New York over the hill?

    Apropos of the previous post, here is one from bloomberg.
  165. doug reich

    Paintball!

    On the other thread you said all paintball is not for the faint of heart :) Why is indoor bad?
  166. doug reich

    Paintball!

    Some of us are thinking of organizing a paintball outing. (See rafting / paintball - QuantNetwork - Financial Engineering Forum for an old thread on prior paintballing) The easiest place to go looks like NYC_PAINTBALL - I have driven by there a hundred times on the way to the Queensboro...
  167. doug reich

    Weird C++/ VS 6.0 behaviour

    Just to check -- you didn't also put the #ifndef lines into the .cpp file by accident, did you? That will cause those problems. The left pane is a little slow to update, I notice. I would be more concerned with compile errors you get.
  168. doug reich

    Baruch MFE Baruch goes to Canada

    It's true that we slipped in the final rankings (they don't seem to be available online anywhere). However, now that we have played all the trading games in a live setting, and we know where the bugs and poor assumptions in our models are, we will be able to send a much stronger team next year...
  169. doug reich

    Weird C++/ VS 6.0 behaviour

    It's not clear what the problem or the solution are. What do you mean by "This did not create the classes as desired." Compiler errors? Which exactly? What was the outcome of the exercise?
  170. doug reich

    Simons's Medallion Fund up 80% in 2008

    Cue unabashed praise...
  171. doug reich

    Resume tip: putting bullets to the right of text

    I don't agree about latex; latex doesn't accept differing opinions on formatting of things. That's fine if you aren't too picky, or if you are really good at hacking tex. However, on a resume you should not compromise on the look. Furthermore, a lot of places expect you to send them a copy of...
  172. doug reich

    Jobs after completing MFE degree.

    Can you be more clear about your goal? The titles you describe are traditionally outside quant roles, and sound like fundamental analysis. If that is your interest, an MFE will not be of use. As for CFA, it shows an extra level of maturity and devotion. I do not think it will help you break...
  173. doug reich

    Unix Timestamp 1234567890

    An omen! That's simply amazing.
  174. doug reich

    Quant paper publications?

    Also look on research papers wiki page.
  175. doug reich

    The Master Happy Birthday thread

    The question isn't really when; we know that. The question really is "how much". :)
  176. doug reich

    Need help to solve this

    What have you figured out? You are probably in a course for which this is a test or homework, and you should therefore have a book that explains exactly how to do these problems.
  177. doug reich

    The Master Happy Birthday thread

    Hear hear! Happy Birthday! I see drinks in your future!
  178. doug reich

    C++, polymorphism and friendly <<

    I don't know the professional way, but I create a virtual "printhelper" function in both Domain and DomainFloating that does the actual printing. virtual void printhelper( ostream& os ) const; The body of this in DomainFloating might call Domain::printhelper( os ). Then I write a generic...
  179. doug reich

    Senate approves restriction on foreign hires by banks receiving bailout

    Not just IT even; anyone applying for a green card must show that they uniquely possess the ability to do their job among Americans. This is determined by putting out an ad and interviewing them yourself; I know someone who did electronics repair and would flip to a page in a textbook and ask...
  180. doug reich

    Resume tip: putting bullets to the right of text

    I was just updating my resume and found that I wanted to put a label on the left margin, and then start bulleting on that same line. That's not possible with the actual bulleting environment, but it can be done by inserting a bullet symbol and then making the tabs look like bulleting. These...
  181. doug reich

    Senate approves restriction on foreign hires by banks receiving bailout

    ... and I'd take money for sex if the price was right (maybe not; I can't say I've thought much about it). Is it possible the industry is not economical at the higher price American workers are asking for?
  182. doug reich

    programs on statistical arbitrage

    NYU has a 4-course certificate program in their math finance program which may interest you. I don't think other MFE programs really offer the same shortcut program you're looking for.
  183. doug reich

    Not Bar some night

    Hi all, I know some people do not want to go to a bar, but would still like to socialize with their classmates. A good alternative would be to go to a restaurant for dinner after class one night. Please vote in the attached poll for the days you are interested in such an event. Note that...
  184. doug reich

    Senate approves restriction on foreign hires by banks receiving bailout

    There's a good reason to keep the government out of business; they will politicize it to the detriment of our competitiveness. It has been said before that the best thing about America is its immigrants. That may be a little extreme, but we will pay for this kind of action.
  185. doug reich

    Requirements for QUANT graduate programs?

    Read FAQ in my signature to begin with.
  186. doug reich

    COMPARE Opinions on Top Programs: LSE, CMU, Cornell, Princeton, NYU, USC

    Please read and search the forums; opinions on all top programs are found around here.
  187. doug reich

    COMPARE Opinions on Top Programs: LSE, CMU, Cornell, Princeton, NYU, USC

    Please read and search the forums; opinions on all top programs are found around here.
  188. doug reich

    Math quant jokes

    I love that part. At that point, there's just no conversation any more. You could still try: "Do you agree that X dollars and X cents are different? Meaning, if I put a number for X, like 1, I would be saying '1 dollar and 1 cent are different'"... then put X=.002 Who knows, it's just a bad...
  189. doug reich

    New Quantnet Features List

    A lot of good new features! I like being able to track my ascendancy to the top poster position on the front page. :) Dan: your days are numbered!
  190. doug reich

    Lehman Merrill Lynch AIG Fannie Freddie WaMu Madoff Citibank saga

    Before posting a snappy reply to Andy's post, please read the Wall Street Journal comments on this topic. Fear not, your opinion is well-represented and more wittily phrased. :)
  191. doug reich

    need your advises

    Read the current and past student bios in the "Introductions" forum. You will see not all students have work experience; some come directly from undergrad. Look on the Baruch MFE website, e.g. There is a list there. As always, be aware that finance is undergoing great turmoil and old positions...
  192. doug reich

    Whats the difference between Columbia's programs?

    There are some excellent threads on Columbia programs from students. Use the tag cloud on the front page to find them, and also look in the education forum.
  193. doug reich

    C# Code

    You probably want to use the String.Format function to do the actual string concatenation & formatting (C# equivalent of sprintf, it seems). Your task is easy; the kind of thing that would come right after the Hello World program, so it's hard to know what you're looking for.
  194. doug reich

    need your advises

    About Cass: Cass Business School - QuantNetwork - Financial Engineering Forum There is information on some of the English schools as well, look in the Education forum for some older threads. Please read some of the other threads around here for opinions on the future job market. It is bad...
  195. doug reich

    AP Investigation: Banks sought foreign workers

    I don't agree with that last conclusion. Can anyone working in finance around here definitively say that banks are somehow paying immigrant workers less than residents? Where is that happening? Bonuses? Base pay? Benefits? It is true that the visa system is widely abused; that's not really...
  196. doug reich

    The Great College Hoax

    For many, private college does not add sufficient value for the cost, without even factoring in the obscene financing methods. Article link: The Great College Hoax - Forbes.com
  197. doug reich

    The party's not over yet -- for some

    Stefan, while a downturn would not normally spell doom on its own, "this time is different". (People are very good at extrapolating straight lines.) Consider the following argument, which, from several months of listening to BBW, seems to match his thinking...
  198. doug reich

    Credit Suisse Bonus Packages

    Who knows, with steel rails you can at least melt them down and sell them back to the plant as raw material; the banks have no capital to take ABSs at any price!
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