NUS RMI Welcomes A/P Chen Yi-Chun as Director and Thanks Prof. Sun Yeneng

On 1 August 2020, RMI welcomed Associate Professor Chen Yi-Chun as the institute’s new Director. A/P Chen received his PhD in economics from Northwestern University and joined the Department of Economics at NUS in 2009. He has been teaching and doing research in microeconomics and game theory, focussing on the robust prediction of strategic behaviours and robust design of economic mechanisms. Since August 2017, he has been serving as Vice Dean of International Relations and Special Duties, overseeing the student exchange programmes and the summer programme, FASStrack Asia. He first joined RMI as a Deputy Director in November 2018 and Director of the Master of Science in Financial Engineering programme in February 2020.

RESEARCH UPDATES

Industry Projects

In 2020, under the leadership of our Deputy Director for Industry Prof. Chen Kan, RMI has launched some research collaborations on industry projects, which aim at advancing the industrial applications of new research in the field. Below are the two new industry projects that are currently in the pipeline:

1. Researchers at RMI have collaborated with GIC on modeling extreme interdependencies among financial assets for risk evaluation and portfolio construction. A preliminary study of modeling the asset correlation structure using vine copula has been completed. The implementation of the vine copula captures the increased correlation at the negative tail of the asset returns. This model gives rise to a better estimate of the tail risk (measured in terms of conditional VaR) of a multi-asset portfolio.

MASTER OF SCIENCE IN FINANCIAL ENGINEERING (MFE)

MFE Updates

On 10 January 2020 RMI hosted its annual on campus information session for the MFE Program’s August 2020 admission exercise. The information session, one of the last in person events held at RMI this year, presented to the participants the program’s curriculum, faculty, students’ profile, and job placement, among others.

When the safety measures were announced by the government to stop the spread of COVID-19, all MFE classes were moved online as pre-recorded sessions initially. To enhance students’ learning experience, all teaching modules were then made available ‘live’ to the students. Student’s feedback on virtual learning has been positive, allowing some new incoming international students joining the August 2020 cohort to take the classes virtually from their home countries and avoiding travel. Exam formats were also adjusted to accommodate the safety measures in place.

EXECUTIVE EDUCATION

Training Programs Updates

This year RMI organized several training programs, most of them were adapted to be conducted virtually via Zoom. In January and May 2020 RMI welcomed its two annual cohorts for its Financial Risk Manager (FRM®) Certification Training Program. This program helps prepare professionals from the financial industry for the rigorous examinations to obtain the FRM® certification. RMI has successfully conducted this Program bi-annually since 2013 and prepared over 250 participants for the examination that takes place twice a year in May and November. The certification is globally recognized and administered by the Global Association of Risk Professionals (GARP).

EVENTS