Derivatives-market

This book is both enjoyable and informative. I will find time to read it again.

I have just read the first three chapters and it looks like I'll finish it soon. Key Financial Instruments is the only readable book on derivatives that I have come across.

incredibly well written - like JK Rowling of Harry Potter and Michael Lewis of Liar's Poker combined

This wonderful book and its companion book "Financial Engineering: Derivatives and Risk Management" have been on the markets more than one year, but still didn't draw sufficient attention from the readers in either academic or practical world. FinMath.com didn't add any of them on its bestseller list, and there's no single reader's review on Amazon.com.
I have both books for a while and like them very much. I consider them as the hidden jewels of quantitative finance books. This book definitely beats the "Investments" by Bodie, Kane and Marcus, and its companion book does the same thing to John Hull's "Options, Futures, and Other Derivatives". If you can find any of them in the bookstore you patronize frequently, I bet you will take it/them to home the same day. Both are published by John Wiley, but priced as [inexpensively] as computer books on mass markets. In addition, the supporting Website has related Excel, GAUSS and PowerPoint files for downloading. The PowerPoint slides have professional quality. The only thing I don't like is the GAUSS program code on the books. I can't imagine anybody would take time to learn GAUSS just for those 2 books, and never understand why the authors didn't give VBA or pseudo code for majority's interest.
Both are written as textbooks, but contain lot of useful information on practical consideration, such as "The market maker Buys the Base currency at the Bid rate - which is the 'low'figure(usually the figure which comes first in the quote)".

This book on interst rates is a pleasurable read. As a trader of interest rate swaps, I find every book on the topic adds something to my knowledge base, and this was better than most for ease of access. Anyone keen to understand all of the related markets, will also want to know more about credit derivatives.

I highly recommend "Credit Derivatives" (2nd Edition) by Tavakoli. The products and their uses are clearly explained, and ties in relative value to the interest rate market. I concede that the models for this product may be trickier because of documentation risk and data issues, but Tavakoli brings clarity to this topic so any interest rate professional can grasp the products and why investors - even hedge funds - are so keen to use them.

This is the best book available on interest rate models. Very detailed. Much more focused and readable than Rebonato's book. More pragmatic and explicit than Musiela and Rutkowski. Not as theoretical as Hunt and Kennedy. James and Webber also looks very good, but I'm not that familiar with it. All other books have only bits and pieces on interest rates.

With all the due respect to the other authors I would say that if one is interested in a good theoretical book whihc is also good on the implementation side then the book of Brigo and Mercurion is definetly the best book I have ever read on the subject.

Anyone interested in implementing the LMM/BGM/MSS model in practice is well advised to read it.

I would just say that this is certainly a must have in the field.

In the late nineties I went through Brigo's innovative work on stochastic nonlinear filtering with differential geometry techniques. I was favorably impressed by results and style, particularly in his dissertation and in his 'geometry in present day science' very readable overview. Interesting results are found and nicely told with accurate - but not pointlessly complicated - advanced mathematics for the problems at hand, I reasoned.

I've followed a similar path from control to finance, and having worked with interest rate models, I couldn't help but order this Brigo-Mercurio book. I had high expectations 'cause these two guys are working in a bank on the real thing.

Sure enough I'm not disappointed.

1-factor models are handled with great care, a ton of formulas and recipes are given. I've never seen this kind of analysis of pricing with Gaussian 1-f models. The new upgrade of the CIR model is interesting and accurate. "CIR++" is now my favorite 1-f model. I like the treatment of lognormal 1-f models and the explanation of Monte Carlo and trees -- the flow-chart for Bermudan swaptions is crystal clear! Plots of market implied structures and volatility calibration are useful additions.

The chapter on 2-f extensions has one of the best discussions on volatility, and two tons of useful formulas/recipes. Two dimensional trees!

The HJM chapter size is OK. I agree - the useful models embedded in HJM are short rate models and market models.

Market models - these three chapters alone are worth the book. You'll find yourself nodding as you read the guided tour. They make it look easy all the time. The exposition is focused, clear, intuitive, detailed. There's also new stuff, just check the calibration discussion! Smile modeling begins with a brilliant tour and ends with Brigo-Mercurio's new approach - the mixing dynamics - deserving a whole chapter if expanded.

The detailed explanation on products is a much welcome original addition. Cross currency derivatives!

Quotes - as in Brigo's old work - are a pleasant diversion while reading. The 500 and more pages are a treat given the competitive price.

Still there's room for improvements - more "CIR2++"! Something on 3-f models. Historical estimation of the correlation matrix and low-rank optimized approximations. Expand smile modeling! More hedging. Something on structured products. Cross currency libor model. chapter 9 - other interest rate models - sounds out of place and can be suppressed for other things.

This book rings true and has useful teachings for students, academics and practitioners. Although it requires some background in stochastic calculus, it's hard to beat on the pricing front. Kudos to Brigo and Mercurio! It only harms there aren't enough books like this.

wow, incredible improvement to the first edition. coverage of all important aspects (i can think of) on inflation. history, example issues, purpose of use from investor & issuer as well as technical points regarding calculation and pricings.

If you are a student just taken up a course in derivatives or risk management you should have this book. if you find john hull more technical, you have Don Chance who covers options and other derivatives in a greater detail and in more words. everything you want to know about how banks etc have risk mangaement systems in place and market risk instruments is here.

in case you want a greater coverage of options and pricing options, you should definatly take a look at Black Scholes and Beyond by Neil Chriss, a work of art.

This is an excellent book for non finance majors who would like to grasp the physical concepts behind different derivatives products traded in the OTC markets. The book is ideal for a preperation read for all aspiring to take Financial Engineering / Derivatives as majors in graduate programs.

If you are interested in the basic concepts governing derivatives without getting into the mathematics of it then this is the ideal book. I recommend this book for any one who is contemplating taking Derivatives as an advanced level course. The book would give a solid foundation to the concepts of risk management.