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Quantitative Finance For Dummies (For Dummies
An accessible, thorough introduction to quantitative finance
Does the complex world of quantitative finance make you quiver? You're not alone! It's a tough subject for even high-level financial gurus to grasp, but Quantitative Finance For Dummies offers plain-English guidance on making sense of applying mathematics to investing decisions. With this complete guide, you'll gain a solid understanding of futures, options and risk, and get up-to-speed on the most popular equations, methods, formulas and models (such as the Black-Scholes model) that are applied in quantitative finance.
Also known as mathematical finance, quantitative finance is the field of mathematics applied to financial markets. It's a highly technical discipline—but almost all investment companies and hedge funds use quantitative methods. This fun and friendly guide breaks the subject of quantitative finance down to easily digestible parts, making it approachable for personal investors and finance students alike. With the help of Quantitative Finance For Dummies, you'll learn the mathematical skills necessary for success with quantitative finance, the most up-to-date portfolio and risk management applications and everything you need to know about basic derivatives pricing.
Covers the core models, formulas and methods used in quantitative finance Includes examples and brief exercises to help augment your understanding of QF Provides an easy-to-follow introduction to the complex world of quantitative finance Explains how QF methods are used to define the current market value of a derivative securityWhether you're an aspiring quant or a top-tier personal investor, Quantitative Finance For Dummies is your go-to guide for coming to grips with QF/risk management.
377 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 18, 2014
72 people are currently reading
134 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
February 17, 2023
Great book for absolute starters in quantitative finance. Gives you many necessary keywords to search about plus enough info so you can actually make some sense of what you are looking up. Although sometimes the content, especially some of the more technical stuff, is presented in a way that could be confusing for people with no prior training in that topic.
If you want to get into quantitative finance with zero financial background but some knowledge of calculus and statistics, this is a good starting point. Of course, after you finish you realize this field is an ocean you have yet to even skim the surface of. So, good luck, folks!
If you want to get into quantitative finance with zero financial background but some knowledge of calculus and statistics, this is a good starting point. Of course, after you finish you realize this field is an ocean you have yet to even skim the surface of. So, good luck, folks!
March 14, 2023
Need a 'Quant finance for dummies for dummies'. Lmfao.
Was pleasantly surprised tho. When I looked online and saw that the author, Steve Bell, is a lecturer at LSE, I immediately expected a book full of pretentious jargon and refusal to simplify needlessly esoteric and isolated concepts (I suspect some LSE profs make shit messy on purpose). Turns out that Steve has a great sense of humor and has the ability to speak like a normal human being. Good on him. I like this dude. Very conversational language.
What I hoped to get out of this book tho, was a philosophical understanding on quant finance, why it exists, and how it reconciles with starkly contrasting strategies and philosophies such as fundamental analysis, value investing etc. Why on earth get a PhD, run deep computational models, backtest and validate and then trade until you blow up, when you can scan balance sheets and hold for the long term and get very possibly better returns?
Lots of the more interesting quant strategies e.g., statistical arbitrage have unreliable returns and underperform good old fundamental analysis. Most people who do quant trading run thousands of backtests, p-hacking until they find a statistically significant market anomaly, then they trade it until they blow up. Makes them look smart in the short run, but long term undocumented market anomalies are rare and typically what they find either isn't real or doesn't last. More illustrative examples of this: LTCM, Alameda Research lol.
Why make your head explode with out-of-this-world math when simple, reliable, intuitive strategies exist? That's one thing I hope to understand.
Shoutout to this book and its author for being a lecturer who strives to teach rather than impress. My boy Steve Bell, if you ever read this, you're a homie.
Edit: Realized that Steve is a physicist not an economist by training so that explains it - he has no physics envy. He's a real one
Was pleasantly surprised tho. When I looked online and saw that the author, Steve Bell, is a lecturer at LSE, I immediately expected a book full of pretentious jargon and refusal to simplify needlessly esoteric and isolated concepts (I suspect some LSE profs make shit messy on purpose). Turns out that Steve has a great sense of humor and has the ability to speak like a normal human being. Good on him. I like this dude. Very conversational language.
What I hoped to get out of this book tho, was a philosophical understanding on quant finance, why it exists, and how it reconciles with starkly contrasting strategies and philosophies such as fundamental analysis, value investing etc. Why on earth get a PhD, run deep computational models, backtest and validate and then trade until you blow up, when you can scan balance sheets and hold for the long term and get very possibly better returns?
Lots of the more interesting quant strategies e.g., statistical arbitrage have unreliable returns and underperform good old fundamental analysis. Most people who do quant trading run thousands of backtests, p-hacking until they find a statistically significant market anomaly, then they trade it until they blow up. Makes them look smart in the short run, but long term undocumented market anomalies are rare and typically what they find either isn't real or doesn't last. More illustrative examples of this: LTCM, Alameda Research lol.
Why make your head explode with out-of-this-world math when simple, reliable, intuitive strategies exist? That's one thing I hope to understand.
Shoutout to this book and its author for being a lecturer who strives to teach rather than impress. My boy Steve Bell, if you ever read this, you're a homie.
Edit: Realized that Steve is a physicist not an economist by training so that explains it - he has no physics envy. He's a real one
January 4, 2017
A good introduction to quantitative finance.
The chapters are well-organized and cover various topics from mathematics, financial products, to trading strategies, risk management and quantitative model design. Moreover, most of the chapters are independent which allows readers to skip them or read them later.
There is not too much calculus which is one the most frequent drawbacks of quantitative finance books that are a bit "dry" for not-mathematical enthusiast readers. In my opinion, reading lines and lines of formulas is useless : either take a pen and a paper and do the calculation on your own to understand where the result comes from or skip to the end and read the final formula.
But if you want more details, you will have to read the classics such as Hull's Options, Futures and Other Derivatives which offer more description of financial products and more calculus.
The chapters are well-organized and cover various topics from mathematics, financial products, to trading strategies, risk management and quantitative model design. Moreover, most of the chapters are independent which allows readers to skip them or read them later.
There is not too much calculus which is one the most frequent drawbacks of quantitative finance books that are a bit "dry" for not-mathematical enthusiast readers. In my opinion, reading lines and lines of formulas is useless : either take a pen and a paper and do the calculation on your own to understand where the result comes from or skip to the end and read the final formula.
But if you want more details, you will have to read the classics such as Hull's Options, Futures and Other Derivatives which offer more description of financial products and more calculus.
December 4, 2017
A good introduction to a complex subject, usefully bridging the gap between maths and it''s application to finance. McCloud doesn't avoid the maths so it's probably useful to have some basic knowledge of calculus and probability/stats - i.e. it's not really 'for dummies'.
February 22, 2025
For Dummies diyor ama icinde baya bir Statistics ve Math var. Cok beginner seviyesi degil Guzel bir kapsama olmus formullerin derive edilmesi anlatimi esprili olmasi bekledigimden daha iyi bir kitapti.
November 8, 2025
Decent introductory read. I feel like more/better diagrams would help break down some of the more advanced concepts, especially for the formulas
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews