Matthew Rothman is the head of Global Quantitative Equity Research at Credit Suisse as well as a Senior Lecturer in Finance at the MIT Sloan School of Management.
He was hired a few years before the financial crisis hit to be global head of Quantitative Research at Lehman Brothers (and then Barclays Capital, post Lehman bankruptcy). In the midst of the quant crash in 2007, he published “Turbulent Times in Quant Land,” a research note explaining the quant meltdown. It subsequently became the most highly distributed research note in Lehman’s history.
Rothman explains why we the current era is “Quant 3.0” – the third developmental wave of quantitative investing. Big data and massive computing power is allowing the processing of information at levels that are exponentially greater than ever before. The world that has become fully digitalized; data sets, storage and computing power are all plummeting in price; the abilities of artificial intelligence are reaching levels barely imagined before. This is having a massive impact on investing and trading.
He is also a huge Bruce Springsteen fan, and as an analyst often weaved song lyrics into his research notes. Rothman reiterated his warnings that Quants must understand where and how their models have failed in the past and will fail again in the future.
A prolific reader, some of his favorite books are referenced here.
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Our earlier podcasts can all be found on iTunes, Soundcloud, Overcast and Bloomberg.
