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About the idea of "Quantitative Finance" in general: Everywhere I look on the Internet, people seem to be saying that Statistics is more relevant to Quant Finance than Mathematics. The quantitative tools in quant finance seem to be based more on upper-year Stat topics (Stochastic process, Multivariate analysis, Time Series Analysis, Probability, Machine Learning) as opposed to upper-year maths (group theory, real analysis, topology). Except for ODE and PDE, which is not used as often then when this occupation first became a thing nowadays anyway.

Dimitri Bianco, the famous quant YouTuber, also said that the best degree for a career in quant finance besides a quant master and a STEM PhD is a Statistics degree.

The similar jobs that are often compared with quants are data scientists (vs quant researchers) and actuaries (vs risk quants), which are obviously more stats-oriented than math-oriented.

So why are most programs still called "Mathematical Finance", not "Statistical Finance"? And why do people still have the impression that quant is a "math" career, not a "stats" career?

I'm just a first-year undergraduate, so there's a lot I don't know and a lot I'm yet to learn. Would love to hear insight from anyone else with experience/knowledge on this topic!

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  • $\begingroup$ You are right that there is not much application of "group theory, real analysis, topology" in Finance. Or Riemannian Geometry, etc. But Mathematics (or Mathematical Sciences, as it sometimes called) is very broad and includes all the other things you mentioned as well, Probability, Stats, Computing, etc. Besides Mathematical Finance is the traditional name and it will be hard to switch to Statistical Finance even though arguably it would be a valid name. $\endgroup$ Commented Apr 22 at 16:18
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    $\begingroup$ See e.g. this recent question and its (current) answer from the site. Would you qualify this as stats or maths? $\endgroup$ Commented Apr 22 at 18:40
  • $\begingroup$ @DaneelOlivaw is it possible for someone with a degree in pure Statistics, who has taken math electives up to PDE, Real Analysis, and a "Stochastic Processes" which for some reason is offered by the STATS department in my univerisity (with an emphasis on Markov processes) to come up with this post, or does it must come from a MATH major who studied Group Theory, Intro to Math Logic and Complex Variables? $\endgroup$ Commented Apr 25 at 1:42
  • $\begingroup$ Probably the only way to know is to ask someone at your university if they (really) understand this article: mat.univie.ac.at/~schachermayer/pubs/preprnts/prpr0084.pdf $\endgroup$ Commented Apr 26 at 8:41

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