(Bloomberg Opinion) -- We take for granted this modern era of quantitative investing. But it wasn’t always this way; for most of modern financial history, there simply wasn't adequate data. That changed in large part due to the work of Roger G. Ibbotson, professor emeritus of finance at the Yale School of Management and this week's guest on Masters in Business.
Ibbotson was executive director of the Center for Research in Security Prices. The data he assembled in "Stocks, Bonds, Bills, and Inflation" led to such great demand for the application of statistics that he started Ibbotson Associates, which was bought by Morningstar in 2005. As a Ph.D. student at the University of Chicago, he ran the endowment’s bond portfolio.
Ibbotson is chairman and chief investment officer of Zebra Capital Management, an equity-investment and hedge-fund manager; he also sits on the board of Dimensional Fund Advisors. He has written numerous books, including "Investment Markets: Gaining the Performance Advantage" and "Global Investing: The Professional’s Guide to the World Capital Markets."
His most recent research paper is "Popularity: A Bridge between Classical and Behavioral Finance." He described how things that become popular are less appealing to him as an investor while unpopular assets are more attractive.
His favorite books are here; a transcript of our conversation is posted here.
Next week, we speak with economist Joshua B. Miller, who proved that the so-called hot hand in basketball is real after all.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Greiff at jgreiff@bloomberg.net
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
Barry Ritholtz is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He founded Ritholtz Wealth Management and was chief executive and director of equity research at FusionIQ, a quantitative research firm. He is the author of “Bailout Nation.”
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