No other text presents such sophisticated topics in a mathematically accurate but accessible way. This book will appeal to professional traders as well as undergraduates studying the basics of finance.
Sheldon M. Ross is the Epstein Chair Professor at the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, University of Southern California. He received his Ph.D. in statistics at Stanford University in 1968 and was formerly a Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, from 1976 until 2004. He has published more than 100 articles and a variety of textbooks in the areas of statistics and applied probability, including Topics in Finite and Discrete Mathematics (2000), Introduction to Probability and Statistics for Engineers and Scientists, 4th edition (2009), A First Course in Probability, 8th edition (2009), and Introduction to Probability Models, 10th edition (2009), among others. Dr Ross serves as the editor for Probability in the Engineering and Informational Sciences.
This new, third edition further bolsters Ross’ text as an excellent introduction to mathematical finance. Plentiful with preliminary material, the book can work for self-study, given that the reader has a solid background in calculus and statistics fundamentals. It would also be helpful to understand the fundamentals of LP models and their duals, as this is an expectation made on the reader for grasping the key proof of the Arbitrage Theorem. Of course, the text can work well as an introductory course for undergraduates. The usage as a textbook on the basics of option pricing better fits the structure of the text which includes exercises at the end of each chapter without any solutions. Also, the examples, while detailed, are less numerous than the proofs, lemmas, and propositions the reader will need in order to comprehend in order to progress.
This was a good introductory book. It was kind of cryptic in places. You really had to be on your toes or you would miss something. But altogether, a good book and one that I am will use as reference in the future.