Pricing the future : finance, physics, and the 300-year journey to the Black-Scholes equation : a story of genius and discovery / George G. Szpiro.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Szpiro, George, 1950-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Options (Finance)--Prices--Mathematical models.

Options (Finance).

Physical Description:

xiv, 298 pages ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

New York : Basic Books, [2011]

Summary:

Mathematician-turned-journalist Szpiro narrates the intellectual history behind the options pricing formula found by economists Fischer Black, Myron Scholes, and Robert Merton in 1973. Describing developments from the middle of the 17th century onwards, his narrative discusses mathematical efforts to understand the value of options, while emphasizing the role of specific personalities such as Robert Brown, Albert Einstein, MIT mathematician Norbert Wiener, Russian theorist of probability Andrey Kolmogorov, and Japanese mathematician Kiyoshi Ito. Annotation ©2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Contents:

1 Flowers and Spices 1

2 In the Beginning 21

3 From Rags to Riches 37

4 The Banker's Secretary 55

5 The Spurned Professor 73

6 Botany, Physics, and Chemistry 81

7 Disco Dancers and Strobe Lights 109

8 The Overlooked Thesis 125

9 Another Pioneer 137

10 Measuring the Immeasurable 143

11 Accounting for Randomness 161

12 The Sealed Envelope 169

13 The Utility of Logarithms 181

14 The Nobelists 195

15 The Three Musketeers 211

16 The Higher They Climb 229

17 The Harder They Fall 241

18 The Long Tail 255.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 277-282) and index.

ISBN:

9780465022489

0465022480

9780465028153

0465028152

OCLC:

701015437