Niels O. Nygaard, Director

Professor in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Chicago since 1982. Prior to joining the University of Chicago he taught at Princeton University. He holds a Ph.D. in Mathematics from MIT. Professor Nygaard has been Director of the Financial Mathematics Program since its inception in 1996. Besides his interest in Financial Mathematics he has done research in Arithmetic Algebraic Geometry and Number Theory

Neil A. Chriss, Executive Director

Neil Chriss holds a PhD in mathematics from the University of Chicago and previously was Managing Director at SAC and quantitative portfolio manager at Goldman Sachs & Co. He is currently Founding Partner in Hutchin Hill, a quantitative hedge fund.

Timothy M. Weithers, Associate Director

Tim Weithers is currently Associate Director of the Program on Financial Mathematics, teaches "Foreign Exchange" (with Al Kanzler and Jeff Krause) and the "Finance Review", and is also Director of Education at Chicago Trading Company (CTC). Tim was formerly a Managing Director at UBS in their Financial Markets Education area, a Vice President at NationsBanc-CRT in their Financial Engineering group, a member of the Education Department at O'Connor/Swiss Bank Corporation, and a university professor. He received his Ph.D. in Mathematical Economics from the University of Chicago and has taught in the Program since its inception. One of his more recent publications is "Foreign Exchange: A Practical Guide to the FX Markets" (Wiley). Finance Review, Foreign Exchange.

Yuri Balasanov

Yuri Balasanov, Ph.D. Head of Research and Trading at AQ Strategies, LLC. Yuri has worked in the financial industry since 1991. He has been teaching Financial Mathematics at the University of Chicago since 1997. Prior to launching Alpha Quant Fund at AQ Strategies LLC he worked at Lotsoff Capital Management as Chief Investment Officer; at Ritchie Capital Management as Director of Quantitative Research and Quantitative Trader; at Bank of America as leading quantitative researcher; and at Chicago Research and Trading (CRT) as quantitative researcher. Prior to becoming an industry practitioner Yuri taught at the Moscow State University where he also received his Master’s degree in Applied Mathematics and Ph. D. in Probability and Statistics. Interest Rate Derivatives

Jack D. Cowan

Professor in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Chicago since 1983. Before joining the Mathematics Department he was Professor and Chairman in the Department of Theoretical Biology. He holds a Ph.D. from Imperial College London and a S.M. from MIT. His main research interests are: Learning and Memory in Neural Nets, Local Bifurcation Theory. Bifurcation in the presence of symmetry. Stochastic non-linear processes with application to neuro- and population biology.

Jon Frye

Jon Frye is senior economist in global supervision at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, where he researches portfolio credit risk models and their application at banks. Prior to the Fed, he devised market risk and counterparty exposure models at large U.S. banks. He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Northwestern University. Jon.Frye@chi.frb.org Portfolio Theory and Risk Management II

Jeff Greco

Principal of Bluehaven Management Group, LLC, an Evanston, Illinois based hedge fund manager. Prior to Bluehaven, he was a Senior Research Analyst with Bank of America's Global Derivative Products Group and Senior Research Associate with Deerfield Capital Management, a Chicago based hedge fund manager. He holds an MS in Applied Mathematics from the University of Chicago and an MS in Mathematics from Carnegie Mellon University. Fixed Income Derivatives I and II

Alfred Kanzler

Alfred Kanzler is Director of Risk Management at Vara Capital, a global macro hedge fund. He holds a Ph. D. in Theoretical Chemistry from the University of Chicago. Prior to Vara Capital he was at Ritchie Capital, where he managed the implementation of risk management systems. Prior to Ritchie Capital he developed risk and pricing models and managed software projects for large international banks. Foreign Exchange

David M. Lee

David M. Lee is Managing Director and Chief Risk Officer at UBS O'Connor. Prior to his current role, he was Regional Head of market risk control at Swiss Bank Corporation based in New York, Tokyo and Hong Kong. He was responsible for monitoring all trading market risks and also assisted in the development of global market risk policy, internal risk measurement and aggregation methodologies. Mr. Lee is a frequent speaker at Risk Magazine and regulatory body sponsored conferences. He holds a MBA in Finance from the University of Chicago and undergraduate degree in Mathematics/Accountancy. Portfolio Theory and Risk Management II

Roger Lee

Assistant Professor in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Chicago. Mathematical Foundations of Option Pricing, Numerical Methods for PDEs

Jack W. Mosevich

Jack W. Mosevich holds a Ph.D. in Mathematics from the University of British Columbia. He is currently working on return enhancement using derivatives and possible use of new technologies such as neural nets and genetic algorithms. Mr. Mosevich regularly presents talks on derivatives and option risk management. He was formerly Associate professor of Computer Science at The University of Waterloo, Canada. Advanced Option Pricing

Per A. Mykland

Professor in the Department of Statistics. He holds a Ph.D. in Statistics from the University of California, Berkeley and an M. Sc. in Statistics from the University of Bergen, Norway. His main research interests are: Martingale theory, likelihood theory, and applications of Probability Theory and Statistics in Finance. Mr Mykland has been joint chairman of the Consulting Program at the Department of Statistics and been a statistical consultant to the Norweigan State Oil Corporation. Stochastic Calculus

Izzy H. Nelken

Izzy H. Nelken is Principal at Supercomputing Applications. He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Rutgers University. Currently he is editing a book on fixed income options and is the editor of "The Handbook on Exotic Options." Mr. Nelken has taught courses on credit derivatives, exotic options, equity swaps and credit and price risk of derivatives. Advanced Option Pricing

Paul Staneski

Paul Staneski is Head of Derivative Solutions and Training at Credit Suisse First Boston in New York. Prior to joining CSFB in 2004, he spent 10 years at UBS, first as a Statistical Analyst in Quantitative Research and then as an instructor in Financial Markets Education. Paul has a degree in Economics from William & Mary and a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from Old Dominion University, where he taught Statistics for 6 years in the College of Business. Prior to his academic life, Paul was an equity research analyst and portfolio strategist at Virginia National Bank (now part of Bank of America). Portfolio Theory and Risk Management I

John Zerolis

John Zerolis is Principal at Angle Vista LLC. In the course of his twenty years in the industry, he has developed leading edge visualization, simulation and symbolic programming techniques for equity, index and F/X options. He is a frequent speaker at RISK seminars. Portfolio Theory and Risk Management I

Sebastien Bossu

Sebastien Bossu is Vice-President at Dresdner Kleinwort in London. He is an alum of the program and frequently visits the program to teach workshops. Sebastien Bossu's Homepage