The Quant Solution

An engaging look at a post-crisis solution to the future of quantitative modeling
Authors Peter Cotton and Yakov Kanter experienced first-hand the role quants play in the markets during their time at Morgan Stanley. There, they were involved in several innovations in credit derivatives, including the first closed form basket pricer. In The Quant Solution, Cotton and Kanter dissect the financial meltdown from a quantitative analyst's perspective.
The first half of this engaging story takes an in-depth look at how a financial supermarket, like Lehman Brothers or Bear Stearns, was run. The second half looks ahead to the future of quantitative finance and the role it will one day play. The challenge, as Cotton and Kanter see it, is to create a model that can be used for any type of industry and security, making it much more transparent and much less vulnerable to manipulation. They discuss here their own work behind this universal model.
Explores the extent to which financial models were responsible for the recent market meltdown
Presents initial research on a universal model that may someday be applied to all securities and industries
Describes how risk warnings from the findings of some quants were ignored before the market collapsed
The quantitative side of finance has always been considered complex, but with this book as your guide, you'll start to see that not everything about quants is complicated.