Part 1: Money Isn't Everything

Mum: Tiger-Mum tendencies, smart, gullible. Dad: non-academic, vocational. Young Jimmy independently arrived at Zeno’s Paradox, and concluded that the family car should never need gas. Reminds me of an anecdote a friend told me about intern interviews for one of the big banks. Something like, if you keep moving half the distance, how many moves do you need to make in order to touch some object? The expected answer was impossible, but I didn’t buy it....

Cracking Codes and Problems at the IDA At IDA, Simons developed a fast code-breaking algorithm for a long-standing problem. However, because this work was confidential, he couldn’t share accomplishments with outsiders. A soap film stretching across a wire frame has minimal area. Plateau’s Problem: Do such minimal areas always exist and are they always so smooth no matter the wireframe? In 1930, ‘Yes’ was proved for 2-D. Almgren, PU Prof, proved it for 3-D....

Markov Chains and Baum A hidden Markov process is one in which the results of the chain are visible, but not the states that help explain the progression of the chain. Like receiving the number of runs scored in each inning without knowing anything about baseball. The Baum-Welch algorithm could estimate probabilities and parameters using a little more information than the results of the hidden Markov chain. Baum, hesitant at first, joined Simmons and applied his knowledge to trade currencies....

Ax, Straus the Data Collector and Axcom Ax wasn’t a likeable character. He got into a lot of arguments/fights. His personal life was in disarray. His early research wasn’t original either - it was comparable to that of trenders. Straus was a data collector. The Telerate machines at trading floors didn’t have an interface for investors to collect and analyze information (a laid-off Michael Bloomberg would later change that). Straus collected tick data on commodities, futures and stocks....