World Cup Forecasting Challenge For Quants

databuff writes "As a break from projecting the strength of subprime mortgages, credit default swaps, and other obscure financial instruments, quantitative analysts at Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, UBS, and Danske Bank have modeled the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Now Kaggle has set up a forecasting competition, allowing statisticians to go head-to-head with these corporate giants. The challenge is to predict how far each country will progress in the tournament."

I for one welcome

[Anonymous Coward]

our bailed-out, match-predicting overlords.

Re:Bias

[TheKidWho]

They're Americans, they're most likely not football fans to begin with!

Thanks, but I'll stick to my current system

[Rogerborg]

Informationally Partitioned Simian Launched Projectile Selection [investorhome.com].

Re:Stats game...

[frenchbedroom]

STFU spammer !

*looks at parent's UID*
*gasps*
A 4-digit prime UID !
*slowly backs away from parent's lawn, sweating profusely*
Ha ha, my mistake, carry on...

A cheaper proposal:

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

For just $10,000 in unmarked and nonsequential bills, Vinnie "the kneecap" is willing to venture a prediction as to when any particular team is going to drop out.

"When yous got a problem, pick Vinnie. We don't predict; we Promise."

For what it's worth...

[Anonymous Coward]

Spain or Brazil - the same as the bookies. So what do the brokers say?

Banks are using other peoples money to make money for themselves, then claiming it's all down to such highly skilled workers (what a joke).

Brains / intelligence has NOTHING to do with the amount of money you earn. I mean am I really supposed to believe that a nurse that wipes other peoples dirty asses are worth less than a gambler? Or a surgeon that saves lives?

Banks that use other peoples money SHOULD be paying dividends back, not cashing in and paying their bosses six figure salaries. It's not as if a clerk gets a share of that whopping bonus pot. Oh and has anyone actually been charged with fraud yet because that is exactly what happened, on a grand scale!

Re:Bias

[russotto]

Of course it can be predicted.

You may not be able to, but that doesn't mean it's not possible.

In fact, it's easy to predict when you're the guy with the control for the remote shock-collar.

Re:What's the x-bar

[severoon]

It's obvious to me with smart people like this behind the analysis, we should bet big on the correctness of their projections. Perhaps we should tie our economy to their analysis in some way that will potentially result in a large windfall? Who's with me?