The Chinese New Year is around the corner. Riding on the festive mood, we are planning to hold a PREMIA Members’ Night on the 12th day of the Chinese New Year, i.e. 18 February 2008 (Monday). We promise that this is going to be an exciting night for our members.

First of all, we have the honor of inviting two eminent speakers Mr. Pei Sai Fan from Monetary Authority of Singapore and Dr. David Lee from Ferrell Asset Management to speak to us on Financial Engineering and Machine Intelligence in the World of Modern Finance. Both speakers are experts in financial engineering and will share with us the use of machine intelligence tools for financial services as well as personal wealth management. The synopses of their talks together with their biodata are appended below.

Second, there will be a sumptuous meal for the night right after the talks when both speakers will stay on with us for any questions on financial engineering.

Third, there will be a lucky draw with four prizes to be won comprising of two iPods Nano 4GB (price $250 each) and two Challenger Gift Vouches of S$100 and S$50, respectively. (Only members are entitled to the draw). In addition, we will announce the winners of the first and second best student papers awards during the night.

Fourth, each participant (member or non-member) will receive a $20 HongBao. There is however, a registration fee of $10 for each member. Each member may also bring one non-member guest by paying a $50 registration for the guest. Thus effectively each member receives a $10 in return as a door gift and each guest actually pays only $30 for a buffet dinner (costing $55++ per head) and to listen to two useful and entertaining talks. Finally, all who are present that night will receive a PREMIA T-shirt.

Please note that the number of participants for the night is limited due to the space constraint. So please register early and make your payment. The online registration will close on 31 January 2008. However, the registration may close earlier if the quota of registration is reached.

Please register online through the registration site and provide your member’s id (which you may find from the Member's Area after logging in using your web account). If you wish to bring a guest, please register on your guest’s behalf and put your name in the Affiliation box. You may pay the registration fee ($10 for members and $50 for guests) in one of the following ways:

(1) by post: Mail your cheque (payable to PREMIA) to Prof. Andrzej Sluzek, School of Computer Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 50 Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 639798;

(2) by internet transfer: email Prof. Sluzek at assluzek@ntu.edu.sg for our bank account’s details;

(3) Pay cash to one of the following representatives if you are with NUS, NTU or I2R: for NUS: Miss Zhang Li (zhangli@comp.nus.edu.sg); for NTU: Miss Gao Yan (GAOY0004@ntu.edu.sg); for I2R: Dr. Lu Shijian (slu@i2r.a-star.edu.sg). Electronic receipt will be issued for all payments. If you have any problem with the registration, please contact Miss Zhang Li at zhangli@comp.nus.edu.sg .


If your membership expired last August and has not been renewed, please renew now in order to enjoy the above privilege. If your membership expired in 2006 or earlier, you need to pay a $5 re-entrance fee if you wish to renew your membership.

The Members’ Night will be held at the Grand Plaza Park Hotel City Hall, 10 Coleman Street (Next to Peninsular Plaza and near City Hall MRT station and Funan Centre) on 18 February 2008 Monday at 6.30 – 9.30 pm. The Hotel’s website is at http://www.parkhotelgroup.com/gpph/gpph00_index.html

Looking forward to seeing you at the Member's Night.

Assoc. Prof. Tan Chew Lim
President
PREMIA

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Program for the Night:

6.30 - 7.00 pm: Registration to receive Lucky Draw Tickets and HongBao.
Lucky Draw Tickets will not be issued soon after 7.00 pm.
So please come early!
7.00 - 7.30 pm: Talk by Mr. Pei Sai Fan
7.30 - 8.00 pm: Talk by Dr. David Lee
8.00 - 9.30 pm: Buffet Dinner
8.30 - 8.45 pm: Announcement of Best Student Papers Awards
8.45 - 9.00 pm: Lucky Draw (by the speakers)
9.00 - 9.15 pm: Distribution of T-shirts

Invited Talks at the PREMIA Members’ Night

Financial Engineering and Machine Intelligence in the World of Modern Finance
by Mr. Pei Sai Fan and Dr. David Lee

Talk by Mr. Pei Sai Fan

Finance research, development work by software vendors in risk and finance profession and industry practitioners' experience over the years have led to vast improvements in using financial technologies to manage a myriad of financial risks. Financial engineering and quantitative finance have become favourite discipline of further study for computer science, engineering and physics graduates or young finance executives who aspire to establish a career in modern finance especially in the fields of structuring complex financial solutions and advanced risk management. Today, no major financial institution in the world, including central banks and financial regulators, can function without the computer-based tools and mathematical / statistical models of modern financial science to keep pace with the fast-paced and huge transaction volume of financial markets, and the increasing sophistication and complexity of financial products. All of which implies a growing place for financial-engineering and risk management expertise as part of the general manager’s pre-requisite general knowledge base. The successful financial services providers and financial regulators must learn quickly to fully exploit the functional benefits of innovation in financial technologies while managing the dysfunctional aspects of that innovation with sound human judgment. This talk is an attempt by Mr Pei Sai Fan, the President of Financial Engineers Alumni Association, NUS Risk Management Institute, and currently the Director & Head of Supervisory Methodologies and Training Division, at the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), to share with the audience generally the current areas of application of financial engineering and computer-based solutions, its benefits and impacts in financial services industry and the some observed trends possible future direction of financial technologies.

Talk by Dr. David Lee

The major difference between top notch and ordinary investment managers is this: top notch investment managers distinguished themselves by acting ahead of others on where supernormal profits will be generated in the future, rather than on where profits were generated in the past.

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?

Savvy investment managers who correctly anticipate profit potential scoured in complicated or misunderstood places and employ suitable tools and techniques can realize these profits. One may call good managers different names but they all share one thing in common. Top notch investment managers are those with high Performance Quotient (PQ). They believed in minimizing regret and avoiding misfortune. This is especially crucial for survival in current times when flow of information and capital is so rapid that most profits and losses occur within a short time. Such time compression phenomena was seen when NASDAQ took 20 years to rise 5 times from 1970 to 1990 but it only took 20 months to spike 5 times during the Internet boom between 1998 and 2000. This time compression effect give rise to varying time scales but most finance models are built on fixed time intervals. To make matters worse, time compression effect resulted in returns that are not normally distributed: measurements and yardsticks such as means, variances and correlations that vary over time. This presents a major challenge for most finance models. Therefore, in a new time-compressed world, portfolio diversification is no longer enough; downside risk protection becomes the key to survival in the new world. Dr. David Lee is the Managing Director and Chief Investment Officer of Ferrell Asset Management. David will share with audience the strategies and use of financial technologies for surviving in the time-compressed world, his market outlook in 2008 and his insight on the hedge fund industry.

Biography of Mr. Pei Sai Fan

Before joining Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) in 1999, Mr. Pei Sai Fan spent 20 years in banking industry. First 10 years were spent in consumer banking, credit control and then corporate lending. Next 10 years were spent in investment banking, capital markets and treasury-related activities. Last held management position in banking career was Senior Vice President & Head of Capital Markets Department at a Singapore local banking group, responsible for origination and underwriting of debt securities and loan syndications, bond sales and trading, project and structured finance, structuring investment and hedging products, market making of interest rate and currency swaps, and options. He was also responsible for strategizing and coordinating investment banking and capital market activities in Greater China, and served as a key member of the banking group’s Asset & Liability Management Committee.

Sai Fan joined MAS in 1999 as Director of Banking Supervision, leading a group of product and risk specialists responsible for supervision and inspection of banks in investment banking, treasury and capital market activities.

In 2003, Sai Fan became Director and Head, Supervisory Methodologies & Training Division, which is responsible for developing supervisory approaches, methodologies, tools and practices for MAS’ integrated and risk-based supervision; implementing quality assurance program to ensure quality and consistency in supervisory standards; developing strategic learning initiatives and trainings to raise the level of risk and product knowledge and supervisory skill of supervisors; and contributing to trainings for regional supervisory communities.

Sai Fan participates regularly in decision-making at internal meetings on banking supervision and Basel II implementation. He led the development of validation standards for Basel II internal rating based (IRB) credit risk models and systems, and was a member of Accord Implementation Group Validation Subgroup meetings, under the auspices of Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS). He is currently involved in developing Basel II Pillar 2 supervisory standards.

Sai Fan holds a (1) 1st class Honors Degree in Economics from Nanyang Technological University (NTU); (2) a Master of Science Degree in Financial Engineering from National University of Singapore (NUS); and (3) a Master of Management Research Degree from Graduate School of Management at The University of Western Australia (UWA). Sai Fan’s current research interest is in corporate governance and risk management, and he has published MAS staff papers on corporate governance. Sai Fan is currently lecturing at NTU on financial supervision, corporate governance and corporate finance for Master of Science in Managerial Economics and Master of Public Administration, and other senior banker executive programme. Currently, he is also the President of Master of Financial Engineers Alumni Club, NUS, Risk Management Institute.

Biography of Dr. David Lee

Dr. David Lee is the Founder and Chief Investment Officer of Ferrell Asset Management (Ferrell), a pioneer in Singapore’s hedge fund community. He was the managing director of Overseas Union Enterprise Limited and Auric Pacific Group Limited. David is currently the Chairman of Singapore Mainboard-listed MAP Technology Holdings Limited.

He assumes overall responsibilities for all investment decisions and oversees the operations of Ferrell. David has over 15 years of experience in Financial Research, Security Trading, and Alternative Investments. Ferrell manages a Long / Short Fund, a Multi-Strategy Fund, and Property Hedge Funds among others. Since its inception in 1998, Ferrell’s funds have generated combined returns of 30% per annum, with triple-digit returns for all its property hedge funds. The firm’s assets-under-management is more than USD600 million.

Earlier in his career, David taught and conducted research at various eminent academic institutions including London School of Economics & Political Science and National University of Singapore. His area of research was in the pricing of financial assets, Semiparametrics and Econometrics. David holds a PhD in Econometrics from the London School of Economics & Political Sciences and was mentored by Peter Robinson. He won various awards for in the field of Forecasting and for his work on Economics and Financial Variables, among others. David had published more than 60 business and academic articles in international financial and economic journals. Some of his recent articles on hedge fund’ performance and asset allocation could be found in the Wiley Finance Series, Journal of Investing and Journal of Wealth Management.