Is the CQF suitable for finance people who have never done any mathematics before?If, say, someone has experience in finance, but does not have any maths background, and wants to pick up some quant skills, they are limited to what they can apply for. Eg. a masters in financial mathematics is excluded because the applicant must have an undergraduate maths background (yet the work covered in a masters is really the basic limit of what one would want to know).Therefore, does the CQF fill this gap, or is it just for people who have at least some undergraduate experience in maths? (In other words, is it suitable for someone who's maths knowledge is limited to the basic Black-Scholes formula and an ability to do basic algebra to work out Durations, NPVs and the like).

You have to know some BSc level maths like integration and probability theory.But for those who don't have such a background, they offer a fast maths coursebefore the actual CQF starts.

Yes, the Math Primer is designed exactly for this situation. Aslo, the entry test might actually help to find out whether you are suitable in the first approximation. There are people with quite different backgrounds on CQF. Given enough personall efforts math should be tractable. But everyone is different. So, just try to do the test, talk to course directors, explain exactly what you can/can't do - they wouldn't want people to fail and shouldn't give any unreasonable advice.

Is the CQF suitable for finance people who have never done any mathematics before?No.The Maths primer and the cert in mathematical methods are for those who need bootstapping into the necessary level.The thing about any postgraduate course in finance is that almost everyone is converting from a different line of study and experience. Thus everyone has holes, you are merely in the situation where you know where your holes are. This is of course good.