<t>I interviewed a few junior software engineers some years ago. I used to ask them to draft on paper a specification (header) for a class "stack", using any syntax they wanted to use. Then I would ask a few questions about how they would use that class in very simple scenarios, avoiding on purpose ...

<t>I'm learning the first basics of Quantitative Finance and don't have a clear view of what it is about yet, but it seems to me that most of it is about modelling and devising systems for trading mostly derivatives, trying to make a profit at low or no risk. Sounds like a few people use options to ...

Which are the main "paths of specialisation" in Quantitative Finance?

The TechInterviews.com website lists some C++ interview questions.

I take your point, but what about the main issue?

<t>But the "non-overridable" aspect that you mention is the concept of "final", which is quite different from the concept of "non-virtual".Including the "final" keyword in Java ensures that the method cannot be redefined by a derived class. Excluding the "virtual" keyword in C++ does not prevent the...

<t>I'd like to get an idea of what Quants do too. Are they always working in the front office, directly for the traders? What kind of software do they generate? Are they like continuously adding functionality and improving on a large system? or maybe writing a series of little programs that get used...

<t>Yes, HankScorpio spotted where I was coming from. Another OO language which supports dynamic binding by default and hence doesn't need the "virtual" construct is Eiffel. Personally I wouldn't go to the extent of declaring all methods of all classes as virtual in C++, but I wouldn't disagree if so...

<t>QuoteOriginally posted by: daveangelwrong .. I dont think the use of virtual destructors is a "quirk" of C++I think that the quirk of C++ is that it allows polymorphism to be broken when a method is not declared as virtual.What is the point of allowing a call to a method of an object of a derived...

I'd say the two sample questions are rather different from each other: the first requires an understanding of the quirks of C++ and the second could be answered by someone who's familiar with an object oriented language, even without C++ knowledge.

I find it funny that some interviewers would bother asking questions about the syntax of a specific programming language. It's like interviewing musicians and asking them questions on e.g. how to move fingers on a guitar.

<t>Thanks guys, your comments have clarified things a lot I wasn't convinced with the binomial model because I was only considering the case where in a time step the asset price can end up either above or below the option's strike price. In that case, with just two states to consider it is possible ...

Thanks for the replies, yes I meant the risk-free interest rate and I can see that it's a bad idea to use it to discount the expected price of an option which is not risk-free.

<t>I'm stuck on the Binomial Model (chapter 5 of the Paul Wilmott Introduces Quantitative Finance) which seems to lead to the counter-intuitive result that the price of a call option depends on the interest rate and not on the growth rate of the underlying asset.It seems to me that this result can b...

<t>For this particular function I think that a hill climbing algorithm might work. Take the steepest path down and after reaching a minimum take the most gradual path up until you get over the next hill. This simple algorithm only works with a limited class of functions though. Are you after a speci...