Phelim Boyle
Actuarial Consultant
Phelim Boyle, Ph.D., FIA, FCIA, is a distinguished professor, actuary, and pioneer of quantitative finance. Best known for initiating the use of Monte Carlo methods in option pricing, Dr. Boyle is also recognized in the quantitative finance industry for using the Trinomial method to price options. His seminal work on Monte Carlo option pricing facilitated the 1980s’ explosion in the derivatives industry.
Dr. Boyle is a professor of finance in the Laurier School of Business & Economics at Wilfrid Laurier University in Canada. Until June 2006, he held the J. Page R. Wadsworth Chair at the University of Waterloo. Additionally, he has published multiple papers on actuarial science and demography. Together with his son, Feidhlim Boyle, he authored the highly-read book, Derivatives: The Tools that Changed Finance. Dr. Boyle continues to actively contribute to the knowledge of quantitative finance.
He has been awarded the Centennial Gold Medal of the International Actuarial Association and was the recipient of the IAFE/SunGard Financial Engineer of the Year in 2005. Dr. Boyle attended Dreenan School, Garron Tower and Queen’s University Belfast (B.Sc.) He earned his Master of Science and Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics with a specialization in Physics from Trinity College, Dublin.
Ren-Raw Chen
Financial Modeling Consultant
Ren-Raw Chen, Ph.D., Financial Modeling Consultant, has over 20 years of modeling experience covering credit risk modeling, interest rate term structures, and continuous-time asset pricing. Dr. Chen has published papers in major financial and professional journals. He has also implemented pricing models for financial companies, including credit derivative pricing models for Lehman Brothers, structural default models for Moody’s KMV, convertible bond and fixed-income derivative models for Grand Cathy Securities Corporation, and a two-factor HJM model for Polypaths Software. Dr. Chen’s modeling capabilities range from deriving closed-form solutions, solving PDEs, implementing Monte Carlo simulations, and carrying out complex calibrations.