Eduardo Schwartz

Biography

During Professor Eduardo Schwartz’ nearly 30 years at UCLA Anderson, he has authored well over 100 papers, publications whose quality is matched only by the wide variety of subjects he has studied. An expert in various dimensions of asset and securities pricing, Schwartz has at various times focused on pricing internet companies, interest rate models, asset allocation issues, evaluating natural resource investments, the stochastic behavior of commodity prices and valuing patent-protected R&D projects. His collected works include more 100 than articles in finance and economic journals, two monographs and a large number of monograph chapters, conference proceedings and special reports.

“I move on, I change,” Schwartz says. “I started on derivatives, then did work with interest rate models, credit risk models and, more recently, commodity models and real options, the application of option concepts to value projects and companies.” Schwartz’ newest paper veers into environmental economics, a look at optimal carbon abatement.

He is among the first researchers to develop the real options method of pricing investments under uncertainty. He is co-editor, with Lenos Trigeorgis of the University of Cyprus, on the book Real Options and Investment Under Uncertainty (MIT, 2001), a compilation of recent papers and classic research in the field. “I began my academic career with a degree in engineering,” says Schwartz, who earned his bachelor’s degree in his native Chile. “My work since has been rooted in mathematical modeling and an interest in stochastic modeling and uncertainty.”

In 2015, Schwartz was named International Association for Quantitative Finance (IAQF)/SunGard Financial Engineer of the Year in recognition of his individual contributions to the advancement of quantitative finance.

Schwartz is the winner of a number of awards for both teaching excellence and the quality of his published work. He has served as associate editor for more than a dozen journals, including Journal of Finance, Journal of Financial Economics and Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis. He is a former president of the Western Finance Association and the American Finance Association. He is a fellow of the American Finance Association and the Financial Management Association International. He is also a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Schwartz was awarded a Doctor Honoris Causa by the University of Alicante in Spain and by the Copenhagen Business School. He also received the 2000 Graham and Dodd Award for his paper “Rational Pricing of Internet Companies,” published in the Financial Analysts Journal. He has been a consultant to governmental agencies, banks, investment banks and industrial corporations.

Education

Ph.D. Finance, 1975, University of British Columbia

M.Sc. Business Administration, 1973, University of British Columbia

B.Eng. Industrial Engineering, 1963, University of Chile