top of page
Quant Finance Boot Camp

Spring 2026

Jan 26, 2026

-

May 1, 2026

I'm a paragraph. Click here to add your own text and edit me. It's easy.

erdosOspin.gif

Checking your registration status...

To access the program content, you must first create an account and member profile and be logged in.

You are registered for this program.

Lecture 01

Next Event

NEXT EVENT

Registration Deadlines

Jan 21, 2026

-

All Erdős Spring 2026 Career Launch Cohort or Alumni Club members who are not participating in another Launch bootcamp

-

-

Category

Launch, Certificate Program

Overview

This boot camp is designed to provide participants with a solid grasp of fundamental probabilistic techniques applied in financial markets.

Slack

Click here to be invited to the slack organization: The Erdős Institute

Click here to access the slack cohort channel: #slack-cohort-channel

Click here to access the slack program channel: #slack-program-channel

calendar-icon.png

Click here to download the Events & Deadlines .ics calendar file

Organizers, Instructors, and Advisors

matt_osborne.png

Thomas Polstra

Assistant Professor

Office Hours:

TBD

Email:

Preferred Contact:

Slack

Do not hesitate to reach out with any questions you may have through Slack @Thomas Polstra

Objectives

By the end of this course, students will be able to:
Use probabilistic techniques to predict stock movement volatility using historical data. Use volatility predictions to evaluate a portfolio's value at risk and to price European option contracts using Monte-Carlo methodology. Create accurate European option price predictions by enhancing Monte-Carlo simulations through the use of control variates. Accuracy will be measured against closed-form solutions to option contracts provided by Black-Scholes option pricing equations. Adjust Monte-Carlo simulations of European contracts for the purpose of pricing more complicated option contracts whose expected value does not have a closed form solutions. Such option contracts may include American, Asian, lookback, and barrier option contracts. Develop hedging strategies which minimize risk and improve expected profit distributions of an option investment strategy. Backtest a trading strategy using historical stock prices.

Disclaimer:
By enrolling in this course you agree that in no event shall the Erdős Institute, its affiliates and their respective employees, agents, representatives and content providers or service providers be liable for damages of any kind, including, without limitation, direct, indirect, compensatory, special, incidental, punitive and consequential damages even if made aware of the possibility of such damages, whether in an action under contract, negligence or other theory, arising out of or in connection with the use, inability to use or performance of any course content, materials or services.

First Steps/Prerequisites

First Steps

Program Content

I'm a paragraph. Click here to add your own text and edit me. It's easy.

Course materials are available on github through the following link:

25231-github-cat-in-a-circle-icon-vector-icon-vector-eps.png
Request Access to GitHub

github message for user

Program Content

Textbook/Notes

Note: our video player does not support playback speed options. You can find a third party browser extension which will allow you to modify video playback speed. For example, this one works for Chrome: video-speed-controller. If you would prefer to avoid a browser extension you can manually modify the playback speed in the javascript console as well: Speed up any HTML5 video player!

Orientation

Lecture

Introduction to class and class requirements.

Slides
Transcript
Code

Stock Data in Yfinance, Returns, and Intro to Stock Path Modeling

Lecture

Gathering data from yfinance, returns, portfolio returns, and introduction to stock path modeling.

Slides
Transcript
Code

Black-Scholes Greeks and Intro to Delta Hedging

Lecture

Lecture on the Greeks and an introduction to Delta Hedging

Slides
Transcript
Code

Volatility Smiles and Merton Jump-Diffusion Model

Lecture

Observing volatility smiles in option market data and introduction to Merton jump-diffusion model.

Slides
Transcript
Code

Probability Review

Lecture

Review of probability basics and the Central Limit Theorem.

Slides
Transcript
Code

Stock Path Modeling

Lecture

Modeling stock paths as random walks and as Geometric Brownian Motions.

Slides
Transcript
Code

Delta Hedging

Lecture

Monte-Carlo simulation of delta hedging

Slides
Transcript
Code

Merton Option Pricing, Delta Hedging, and Implied Volatility

Lecture

Overview of Merton option pricing and greeks and the implied volatilities corresponding to Merton pricing.

Slides
Transcript
Code

Probabilistic Methods in Python

Lecture

Demonstration of probabilistic methods in Python, confidence intervals, and vectorized coding in numpy.

Slides
Transcript
Code

European Options and Black-Scholes Formulas

Lecture

Risk-free-interest rates, risk-free GBM models, European options, and Black-Scholes formulas.

Slides
Transcript
Code

Black-Scholes Assumptions versus Real World

Lecture

Exploring Black-Scholes modeling assumptions versus real-world stock data.

Slides
Transcript
Code

Merton model fitting

Lecture

Demonstration of effective techniques of fitting Merton model to market data

Slides
Transcript
Code

Project/Homework Instructions

I'm a paragraph. Click here to add your own text and edit me. It's easy.

Project/Team Formation
Project Submission
Projects README

Schedule

Click on any date for more details

Orientation & Setup Week: Jan 26 - 30, 2026
Phase 1 - Instruction and Project Completion: Feb 02 - Mar 20, 2026
Project Review & Judging: Mar 23 - Mar 26, 2026
Phase 2 - Intense Interview Prep & Career Connections for Certificate Holders: Mar 27 - May 1, 2026

Lecture 01

Feb 3, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Office Hour

Feb 11, 2026 at 07:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Office Hour

Feb 18, 2026 at 07:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Office Hour

Feb 25, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Office Hour

Mar 4, 2026 at 07:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Office Hour

Mar 11, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 02

Feb 5, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 04

Feb 12, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 06

Feb 19, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 08

Feb 26, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 10

Mar 5, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 12

Mar 12, 2026 at 05:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 03

Feb 10, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 05

Feb 17, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 07

Feb 24, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 09

Mar 3, 2026 at 06:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Lecture 11

Mar 10, 2026 at 05:00 PM UTC

EVENT

Project/Homework Deadlines

Jan 31, 2026

04:59 AM UTC

Last chance to switch bootcamps

Email Amalya Lehmann at amalya@erdosinstitute.org if you would like to switch to a different bootcamp.

Feb 12, 2026

04:59 AM UTC

Last day to defer enrollment to a future cohort

Contact Amalya Lehmann (amalya@erdosinstitute.org) if you would like to unenroll from this cohort and defer to a future cohort.

Mar 21, 2026

03:59 AM UTC

Final Project Deadline

Submit your final project by this time.

©2017-2025 by The Erdős Institute.

bottom of page