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What are quant skills useful for?

Jesse Jukic

Jesse Jukic

Joined
4/25/12
Messages
4
Points
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Seems like a strange question I know but I am referring to the various functions that these skills can be applied to. If it help this is specific to Business Owner / Entrepreneur / Venture Capitalist. I am considering taking up these subjects in hoping that they will be the most powerful skills at my disposal.

MSQ171 - Business Data Analysis MAF203 - Business Finance MAE201 - Competition and Industry
MAE102 - The Global Economy MAE301 - Microeconomic Theory and Policy MAF202 - Money and Capital Markets
MAE305 - Business and Financial Forecasting MAE356 - Analytical Methods in Economics and Finance MAF384 - Financial Modelling
MAE306 - Applied Econometrics for Economics and Finance MAF308 - Derivative Securities MAF307 - Equities and Investment Analysis

That would be over a period of 15 months. Taking it slow because I have other commitments.
 
Your question is somewhat vaguely phrased. Quant skills in the MFE context that people refer to this site are mainly focused in quantitative finance, modeling, pricing, etc.
Having good background on economics/financial forecasting may/may not be useful for you unless you can precisely identify what you will be doing as a "Business Owner/Entrepreneur/VC". What kind of business/product/industry will this be?

If you business will be data-driven, having a quantitative training in data analysis would be a bonus.
 
I was thinking more along the lines of will I be able to use modelling/forecasting/econometrics for example in making sense of large amounts of perhaps market research data to give me an edge in business or use them to analyse a business investment opportunity to get a clearer idea of whether the business is worth investing in or not. Those kinds of uses. sorry for being vague but I am working more off what I have been informed about the subjects than an understanding of the disciplines themselves. Thank you for bearing my ignorance!
 
On quantnet, quant tends to refer to stuff that is very quantitative in nature, big emphasis on mathematics, statistics, and programming. Most of the members here are doing Master of Financial Engineering degrees or quantitative PhDs. We probably don't have the most insight into what appear to be undergrad business courses. Your questions may yield a better response from an undergraduate business or MBA forum. Hope this helps clarify... Good luck finding answers to your questions!
 
nice DP. Yes I understand that I have come to a very high-level forum but my reasoning for doing so was that I could get the perspective of those in the know as to whether I should pursue this line of study before spending the neat 10 years on it. I want to know how these skills will be useful in the above mentioned areas. Will these kinds of skills give me the clarity to see beyond the financial reports in terms of investing. Are these skills useful or necessary in building systems around algorithms to automatically search out and interpret data and put it into an evolving model?\

I'm not sure I'm making the most sense but give me a hand here because you're the people who can ultimately answer my questions.
 
Jesse Jukic said:
... or use them to analyse a business investment opportunity to get a clearer idea of whether the business is worth investing in or not.
Click to expand...

You're in the wrong place. The areas of interest to you are known as 1) Management (or equivalently, cost) accounting and 2) Managerial Finance. In my time books like Stephen Lumby's "Investment Appraisal and Related Decisions" were useful. These areas are far removed from quant finance.
 
Jesse Jukic said:
you're the people who can ultimately answer my questions.
Click to expand...

To be honest, you are mistaken; we really aren't the people who can best answer your questions. The three areas you want to apply your skills (Business Owner / Entrepreneur / Venture Capitalist) are not of direct relevance to quant finance, so you are unlikely to get someone here that has much experience in those fields. Refer to my above post, the people that could answer your questions would be on an MBA forum.

Don't feel like we are intentionally being unhelpful or avoiding your questions. I'm just trying to point you in the right direction.
 
Ok sorry guys I had thought that financial modelling and econometrics and so forth would help in determining the best course of investment analysis as well as finding trends in data but either you've never applied your skills in that way or I don't understand the skills fully. Either way sincere thanks for your time and responses and if it's relevant i'll come back and amend this discussion. Oh BTW when you say MFE is the E Economics or Engineering because different sites say either in reference to quants.
 
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