Quantitative Finance in China

Paul Shaw (CEO of 7city Learning) and I have just returned from a week in China, starting in Shanghai and then going on to Beijing. We were invited there to explain about the Certificate in Quantitative Finance. I spoke at various exchanges, at universities and with government officials. We met with Mr Xia Bin, Director General and Research Fellow of the Financial Research Institute, which is the finance arm of the Development Research Center of the State Council of the P.R.C. The FRI will be endorsing the CQF as the best-practice financial engineering qualification for those working in or wanting to work in the emerging derivatives market in China.

As well as being a very successful business trip it was also an impressive social whirl. I have never eaten so much so consistently in all my life. Every day we had at least one 'banquet' (usually two) of typically a dozen courses. These banquets would sometimes take place in what I can only describe as Chinese versions of country estates, just a few of us and the staff in the middle of acres of lakes and lawns. What surprised me was that in eight days we only had two, small, bowls of rice. Given the vast amount we ate, with so few carbs, I think I can now vouch for the Atkins diet! The photo shows me having a late-night snack of scorpion, bought at a street food stall in Beijing.

If all goes well I hope to return to China later this year.