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The Perils of Simplifying Risk To a Single Number
A few weeks back we discussed the perspective that the economic meltdown could be viewed as a global computer crash. In the NYTimes magazine, Joe Nocera writes in much more depth about one aspect of the over-reliance on computer models in the ongoing unpleasantness: the use of a single number to assess risk. Reader theodp writes: "Relying on Value at Risk (VaR) and other mathematical models to manage risk was a no-brainer for the Wall Street crowd, at least until it became obvious that the risks taken by the largest banks and investment firms were so excessive and foolhardy that they threatened to bring down the financial system itself. Nocera explores the age-old debate between those who assert that the best decisions are based on quantification and numbers, and those who base their decisions on more subjective degrees of belief about the uncertain future. Reliance on models created a 'false sense of security among senior managers and watchdogs,' argues Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who likens VaR to 'an air bag that works all the time, except when you have a car accident.'"
So what's the VaR of using VaR? :)
When you don't have a leg to stand on, don't even get up.
Indeed we did. And I think we came to the consensus that it was a load of bollocks.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
You're looking at it all wrong! I mean, you may be right (that they are all lying, thieving, immoral, unethical, and greedy f'ing bastards), but there's opportunity in that!
Had you BET on that, you'd be rich right now. You can invest in the potential downfall of many securities. Which, by the way, was what many of the financial companies and hedge funds did.
And I really don't think this is a "if you can't beat them, join them" situation. It's recognition of human nature, and investing with that recognition in mind. You aren't necessarily doing anything illegal or immoral by betting on the downfall of companies. You are wisely investing.
Looking at it that way, many moral, ethical Wall-streeters may have made lots of money on the downside fluctuations in the market, and so your premise that they are *all* thieves must be incorrect.
Is here any roleplayer that does NOT know how using an artificial value to describe "real" problems automatically leads to some people "playing the system" instead of playing the game?
Nobody here ever had a munchkin in his troupe? A powergamer? A minmaxer? Someone who learned the rules and immediately started to look for loopholes, how to play by the rules without actually taking them serious?
Now why did anyone think this would be different when real money is involved, and thus the incentive to abuse the rules way higher?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Mmm. Herd instincts for the lose. But the few financial instituitions that stood against the headwinds are now reaping the rewards. For example, in the UK LTSB is taking over HBOS, despite the fact that HBOS was nearly twice LTSB's size at the height of the boom. The rational players are doing just fine.
[FUCK BETA]
Beyond the style of model, the trouble in finance is the feedback nature. If a big impressive model is developed to price an asset and all of the big boys buy in and use the model, then the model DOES describe the assets price. Because everyone is making decisions based on the model.
That's all great until reality intervenes. Then you have a bubble.
That sort of model feedback has always made finance seem "iffy" to me.
Use the Firehose to mod down Second Life stories!
Liberal economics -- not liberal politics, quite the opposite most of the time -- explicitly derives its conclusions from three assumptions: that individuals make rational decisions, that they have access to information, and that they are free to buy/sell.
Those are pretty reasonable assumptions, and, when they hold, the conclusions tend to hold.
The difference with physics is that when physicists start saying "assuming that this body is of negligible mass and at non-relativistic speeds" they don't end their exposé with "thus we have a solution to the three body problem for three super massive black holes at 0.999 c"
Social psychology has shown repeated instances where rationality is seriously impaired. For example, social proof can make us all really stupid. And cognitive dissonance is a bitch. What do those words mean? When a million idiots do something stupid, you're very likely to think it's a very good idea, too. And the longer you've been doing something stupid without negative consequences, the less likely you are to stop.
Add to that the fact that those "investment vehicles" were designed to conceal information, specifically financial risk, and right here you have two out of three pillars of classic economic theory missing. Is it any wonder the whole thing went down?
Finally, I wonder if any free marketer / libertarian types actually read any Adam Smith. I remember reading a quizz, which unfortunately I can't find anymore, Marx vs. Smith, in which you were asked to identify whom had written what. Very hard to tell them apart in some cases.
Exactly. And one easy way to game the system is to bet that the authorities will always act to keep markets stable, which you can do by taking risks that would otherwise be stupid. In other words, traders are incentivized to leech off the taxpayer. I'm surprised the crash took so long.
Reduce, reuse, cycle