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Paul Wilmott book

Posted: September 20th, 2008, 11:40 pm
by barny
QuoteOriginally posted by: PaulTJ, that's really just people being even more sheep-like than usual!barny, they do warn in the book's publicity that you'll either love it or hate it! The definition of 'beginners' includes knowledge of calculus, depending on the level of your maths you might think things are skipped when others wouldn't. If I give an 'advanced' course these days I find that a lot of people attend have what I would call very mediocre skills. This wasn't the case a decade ago. This is unfortunate for everyone concerned. But then that's not just quant finance that's education in the west. If you are struggling, barny, then read some of the Schaum books. If you PM me I can give you a list. I can help you get through my terrible book! (BTW you'll probably hate the three-volume PWOQF2 even more!)PHehe thank you Paul, really though I'm not as terrible a Mathematician as you make me out to be. I don't have a problem following the Math, I just think in some parts of the book you say something which to you is completely obvious but to a complete newcomer/layman to finance isn't, and that your explanations sometimes get a little confusing, particularly the order in which you've explained things. As a Physicist/Mathematician I'm used to seeing an overall statement/theorem and then explaining the bits of that to arrive back at the theorem, sometimes you just explain the bits and have the theorem at the end. This makes it exceptionally hard to follow because you have no idea where each of the little bits are going or what they mean! At least that's what happened to me. Really though the book is not bad, my review was perhaps a little harsh and I didn't qualify it properly - if you are intending to learn quant finance from scratch with no previous knowledge and you're only using Paul Wilmott introduces Derivatives and no other books, then I think it is a bad book for that purpose, and the fact that the book touts itself as "The perfect introduction" is I think, misleading. If you however use the book in conjunction with some other books(Hull, for example) then actually I think it is a good complement, and shows you a different side to derivatives to that of Hull for example. In any event, there is definitely lots of useful things to learn in your book that aren't covered as well in other books, and for only £30, it is a worthwhile addition to your bookshelf.

Paul Wilmott book

Posted: September 21st, 2008, 7:54 am
by Paul
A more important problem is that the book only teaches classical quant finance. I.e. the stuff that is so clearly wrong! But it's wrong in almost every book out there. That's why I hope you will persevere because if you can get through PWIQF2 you will be able to get through PWOQF2 which has all the good stuff, explaining (long before recent events!!!) why popular models don't work and which models are better!P

Paul Wilmott book

Posted: September 23rd, 2008, 4:32 pm
by C3I2
I'm probably not the first to wish that Ch 75 Bonus Time also had a few tips about how to argue for your own bonus. Since in our world there really is not objective system, if you manage to anchor the perspective of the other party half the battle is won.

Paul Wilmott book

Posted: May 1st, 2010, 2:34 am
by sigmafield
Hi, I would like to have the C++ codes that accompany the Paul Wilmott Introduces Quantitative Finance + PWQF 3 Volume? Is it possible to have such codes? I'm a student and I'm learning C++ by myself now... Thanks a lot

Paul Wilmott book

Posted: May 27th, 2011, 11:20 am
by Cuchulainn
On page 475 (Vol II) there is the Parisian PDE involving two time variables t and tau. Fine.Just a general remark: can we consider consider trigger time tau as 'just another variable' and then the PDEV_t + V_tau + etc. can be considered as having a hyperbolic part in (t, tau)? So, we need 1 boundary condition for V_t + V_tau at tau = 0(reset time) and model until tau = execution period? Will the PDE for Parasians be different?

Paul Wilmott book

Posted: May 28th, 2011, 9:18 pm
by quantmeh
how does one write a book like Wilmott's? it's fascinating to me. one has to know so much in quite a broad field.