AI for Finance

Finance students and practitioners may ask: can machines learn everything? Could AI help me? Computing students or practitioners may ask: which of my skills could contribute to finance? Where in finance should I pay attention? This book aims to answer these questions. No prior knowledge is expected in AI or finance.

Including original research, the book explains the impact of ignoring computation in classical economics; examines the relationship between computing and finance and points out potential misunderstandings between economists and computer scientists; and introduces Directional Change and explains how this can be used.

To finance students and practitioners, this book will explain the promise of AI, as well as its limitations. It will cover knowledge representation, modelling, simulation and machine learning, explaining the principles of how they work. To computing students and practitioners, this book will introduce the financial applications in which AI has made an impact. This includes algorithmic trading, forecasting, risk analysis portfolio optimization and other less well-known areas in finance. Trading depth for readability, AI for Finance will help readers decide whether to invest more time into the subject.

Edward Tsang is a retired professor and a freelance consultant. With a first degree in finance and a PhD in AI, he has broad interests in constraint satisfaction, optimization, AI and finance.