New Quant Tools Democratize World of High Finance

There is a revolution taking place in quantitative finance. The average person, those without advanced degrees from University of Chicago, Harvard, MIT or London School of Economics, but those who might have unique market insight, is being given opportunity previously reserved for the PhD class. There is a key to success when a new breed of “quant” comes to play in what is a Darwinian market place: the formulas must work or the quant will parish. Making this opportunity possible is an increasing array of quant-driven and algorithm tools and platforms that democratize the cult of high finance.

A man who wanted what wasn’t offered develops a volatility algorithm

In June of 2016, Dan Houghton, carrying the weight of a “first-class degree in mathematics and a masters in natural language processing from the University of Cambridge,” ate a burrito in London and wondered about his future. He had worked at Skype and in his spare time created and sold a text-messaging service. Now he wanted a method to manage his capital that was different from the mainstream.

A voracious consumer of information, the accomplished entrepreneur picked up the book The Ivy League Portfolio by quant blogger and author Mebane Faber, who also runs his own hedge fund.