Volume 15 Issue 1

VOLUME 15 ISSUE 1

15-1

LEVT > 08

Amsterdam trip > 09 PINKWIN and Penguin > 20/21

Case Choice Marketing> 10 Adventures of the 47th board > 12

In this Estimator you will also learn experimental approximations of pi > 22

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foreword

01

from the president

>>47

Dear reader, Congratulations, you are the proud owner of the first Estimator of the academic year 2012/2013! This should be nothing less than the highlight of your day, however it also precedes the inevitable realization that the academic year is currently in progress and won’t be slowing down for a while. The last memories of the summer holiday begin to fade, like the tan you’ve carefully built up lying on the beach of some exotic destination that carries no resemblance to Rotterdam in any way.

But not to worry, the Econometrisch Dispuut is here for you to fill the void in your life you might have had since the ending of summer holiday. This is not an empty promise: we have got an exciting year full of activities planned especially for you! Not to say that we haven’t been active as of yet: the beginning-of-the-year chaos that comes along with all the new students joining our association has already brought plenty memorable moments. Think about the two introduction camps, Pinkwin and Penguin, the first-years days and also two business events with prestigious companies.

Another big change within the structure of the ED, which has probably already been noted by the observant reader, is that this year everything is either bi-lingual or in English, such as this Estimator. This fact is of course because we have now officially two studies to represent: the Dutch Econometrics and its International brother. I hope we have made everyone feel at home in this beautiful city. This also holds for the Dutch citizens who aren’t originally from Rotterdam, and I hope even the native ‘Rotterdammers’ feel like the ED offers them a second home.

So far so good, and there is plenty more of ED-goodness to come your way in the coming future. The coming months are lined up with plenty of social and business oriented events. So whether you like to have a beer with us, prefer to score some points with a recruiter from your favorite company, or a combination of the two: feel free to drop by and ask what we have to offer you.

So I’d suggest, after thoroughly having read this edition of the Estimator, that you quickly browse through the pictures of last summer, think about the good times you had, but soon after gladly realize that there are plenty more of good times to be had in this academic year. Hopefully we can help you to provide a few of those moments.

I wish you all a good year.

x Christiaan Lensvelt President of the Econometrisch Dispuut 2012/2013

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p e r i o k i e k maga z in e

02 Table of contents 01. From the presidential // 03. Editorial // 04. Agenda 06. Who is who? //08. LEVT // 09. Amsterdam Trip // 10. Case choice marketing 12. Adventures of the Board // 14. Alumnus tells 16. Beleidsrede // 20. Penguin // 21. PINKWIN 22. Experimental Approximations of pi // 24. SPED 26. WALV // 28. Cobo and Social Drink // 29. Puzzle 30. Chef // 32. Studysection // 34. List of graduates

09 10 24 28

p

p

p

p

Amsterdam Trip

Case choice Marketing

SPED

COBO

The international students made a trip to see our nations capital: Amsterdam ×

It was time for the first Case Choice of the year: Case Choice Marketing ×

This summer there was a wonderfull trip to Brazil, after 2 months of work ×

The new board was congratuated at the traditional constitution drink ×

Advertisements 00. NIBC // 05. Merchandise // 31. Econometie.com // 36. StudyStore 37. Optiver // 38. Mercer

Colofon Final Editing > Emiel Verhaert Editorial Office > Sierk Wiegers, Max Schotsman, Jelle Huisman, Marijtje van Leeuwen and Ruud van Luijk Office address > Erasmus University Room H11-02, Burg. Oudlaan 50, P.O box 1738, 3000 DR Rotterdam, estimator@ectrie.nl Acquisition > Roman Gorlov, phone: 010 - 408 14 39 > 900 copies Next edition > Beginning of 2013 Printer > Nuance Print Design/DTP > Het Econometrisch Dispuut. Estimator is a periodical from the Econometrisch Dispuut

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editorial

 03

A flying start!

From left to right: Marijtje van Leeuwen, Max Schotsman, Ruud van Luijk, Sierk Wiegers, Jelle Huisman, Emiel Verhaert

> Dear reader, After a flying start of the year where many events have taken place, we proudly present you the first Estimator! This year for the first time the Estimator will be published in English and this has brought us challenges which, thankfully due to the commission have all been solved.

The Estimator is the no. 1 Econometrics magazine in Rotterdam full of interesting articles and reports of recent events that have taken place like social drinks and information about company events. You will also find a mathematical article and a puzzle to pass your time while using your brain as well.

This year the Estimator will be brought to you by the brand-new committee shown above.

We are doing our best to make this year a grand success!

>>

Until now many events have taken place with reports you will find further on in the Estimator. For example, the introduction camps PINKWIN and Penguin, the trip to Amsterdam, a report of the SPED-trip to Brazil, the presentation of the Freshman Committees and much, much more.

We wish you a lot of pleasure with reading! x Emiel Verhaert

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04 Agenda

Agenda 10 January: ABN AMRO In-house day 10 January: Post-exam drink January: Beta + students teachers drink January: Speeddating January: Poker tournament 1 February: Flow Traders In-house day 5 February: LED (National Econometricians Day) 7 March: Post-exam drink March: ED-weekend March: iCansultancy April: CC Finance May: Soccer tournament *The dates shown above are subject to change

>>

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ED MERCHANDISE headphones tie Choker umbrella towel Cocktailglass Bathrobe shower radio Computer mouse sweater Cuff-links

€ € € € € € € € € € €

10 10 15 7,5 10 7,50 25 11,50 13 20 10

06 Who is who?

who is who? > This year we have two wonferful new committees: the freshman committee and the first-year committee. These committees organise all sorts of events throughout the year. x

>> Dear fellow students, my name is Jeroen Vester and I’m 19 years old. I live in Rotterdam and joined Laurentius this year. But the best part is of course to be the chairmen of the First-Year Committee and it’s going to be a fantastic year, all my fellow committee members are awesome and we are gonna rock each event. I hope to meet you all at one of our activities, organized by the ED. The last drink and the pooltournament were legendary. So I hope to see you all at the next activity! x

Hello, my name is Mechteld Ferment and I’m a second year student. This year, I am the chairwoman of the Freshmen Committee and I’m lucky to have such a great team of freshmen in my committee. I like to fill my time by doing several committees at the university, rowing a few times a week and hanging out with friends. I’m looking forward to making this new committee the most awesome one of the ED! x

Dear all, I’m Florine Groenen, 19 years old and I’m in the Freshmen committee of this year. Being a freshmen means to me that we’re at the start of a couple of crazy years called ‘studentlife’, where we’re going to have a lot of fun and hope we can combine that with studying. I would like to help out with the fun-part by organizing some cool activities for the upcoming year with the others from the FC. x

My name is Jaap van Elsäcker and I am 18 years of age. I still live with my parents, in Nieuwerkerk aan den Ijssel. I play Korfball and I work in the grocery store. I also am a fan of football and actually love all kinds of sport. This year I am a member of the Eerstejaarcommissie and until now I like it. I hope we can still organize a lot of fun activities for the members of the ED! x

Hi there! My name is Tjeerd Kohler, first year student of Econometrics in Rotterdam.

Because of the PINKWIN camp I have become familiar with the ED and the EC and it seemed nice to sign in for the committee.

Furthermore, I like a good game of football and I like going out with my friends. Next year I really would like to become a member of a student association, but let’s first get all 60 points of the first year. x

My name is Ricardo de Boer. I am nineteen years old. I grew up in Eindhoven, the Netherlands.

Currently I am living with my best friend in Rotterdam. I love boxing and fitness. I chose for the Freshmen Committee so I can organize events for my class so they can socialize more than only during the lectures. x My name is Edward Wang, I am 18 years of age and life in Delfgouw, a town next to Delft. I chose to become a member of the EC because it seemed nice to organise events together with my study mates. After being a member of the EC for more than a month I am very happy that I signed up for the committee. There is a good atmosphere in the meetings and the first activity organised by us was acoording to me a success. x

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who is who?

I’m Wendelien Bakelaar; a freshwoman trying to make the most of her university experience. I became a member of the FC for two main reasons; as a Dutchie, I wanted to share the best of Holland with my international classmates and as someone new to Rotterdam, I wanted to be a part of making everyone have an amazing first year at Erasmus.

After all, university is not just about studying. x My name is Jacco Teitsma, and this year I have started with the study Econometrics.

At the moment I still live with my parents in Alphen aan den Rijn, however, from the first of december I will be a proud Rotterdammer.Of course I have registered myself at the ED on the first day of uni, and because it seemed nice to be more involved, I signed up for the ‘Eerstejaarscommissie’ because it seemed nice to organise a number of activitities with and for fellow students. x

Hi, My name is Oren and I am 19 years old. Although I am from Israel, I spent a big portion of my life living abroad and I really enjoy traveling and seeing the world.

Like everyone else, I chose to study econometrics for the easy courses and flexible hours. The freshmen committee is the best way to exploit all this “free” time and make sure we all have a better year. Cheers! x Hee! My name is Merlijn and this year I am one of the strictly selected members with a place in de EC. Chosen to talk fancy during a ’meeting’, eat one of the many treats and to receive a lot of spam in the group chat. But also to organise a tournament, something for everyone, to represent a course, and to make it more fun for fellow first year students. And the last part counts heavily. x

My name is Bob Muijs. I’m eighteen years old and I grew up in Enschede, the Netherlands. I like hanging out with my friends and sports. At the moment I live in Rotterdam with two good friends from Enschede. I thought it would be a good idea to be more involved with the events that take place during this year and that’s why I decided to join the Freshmen Committee. x Hee, I am Bernadette, 18 years of age and a first year student of Econometrics. This year I have taken place in the eerstejaarscommissie. I chose to sign up because it appealed to me to organise activities with fellow students and that also seems a nice experience. I hope everyone will have as much fun as I will be having!

Love, Bernadette x

07

I am Jan Radermacher and one of the new international econometrics students. I come from Germany and have been living in Rotterdam for two months now.

I joined the Freshmen Committee because I like to organize events for my class mates and love to get to know new people. Being an active member of the ED is a great way to do both! x Hee, My name is Vicky I am in my first year of Econometrics. Besides my study I also wanted to do something else and that is why I am now in the EC from the ED. We already organised the pooltournament with success and I therefore hope to organise many other fun activities for the members of the ED! x

My name is Sophie and I too am this year in the ‘Eerstejaarscommissie’.

I am 19 years old and in the mean time I am in my second year of Econometrics. Since June I have a room in Rotterdam and this year I became a member of a student association. The pool tournament has already passed, but I am sure that there will be much more fun activities with our EC! x

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08 levt

LEVT “Full of self-confidence we entered the field for our first game.”

Working hard as I did last year, I found myself in the boardroom with a liquid consumption. It was then I noticed a flyer for the ‘Landelijke Econometristen Voetbaltoernooi’, the gathering of econometricians throughout the Netherlands for a game of football: one of the few activities I hadn’t eliminated from my ED-bucketlist. When I asked the 47th board whether I could join their board-team, they told me they could really use 46-carat players like me. Due to my excellent relations with similar players, we added a few to our already unbeatable football team so we could travel to Maarssen full of confidence.

> When we arrived, where it should be noted the 46-carat players had a private playing chauffeur and the 47th board an undoubtedly good time with public transports, we got our team shirts and started with our warming-up. Our warming-up was very promising - mainly due to the fact we were the only ones who kept going in spite of the rain (sissies!). Full of self-confidence we entered the field for our first game. We immediately noticed that most of our opponents were feminine – and not unattractive at all. Grinning at each other, we knew this

probably was a push-over: it seemed very unlikely they would outrun us with home-trained positional play. A 7-0 victory was the result of our first game.

Satisfied we returned to the canteen for our lunch. However, our mood quickly changed when we glanced at our group table.

In all their (limited) wisdom, the organization from Groningen decided to place us in group 5, where even the winner had no chance of continuing to the finals. Naturally, we believed the organization had made a mistake. We were shocked when we found out the truth: due to the

fact we had two women playing in our team, the wise men from the North had decided to place us in a whole group with feminine players. Apparently, close to the German borders a racial segregation is used as in the past century, because this ‘minority’, we were told, had no chance in the finals. Therefore, our northern friends had decided that the whole group couldn’t compete for the trophies.

Disillusioned we started our next game (directly followed by another two games, cheers for whoever made the fixtures!) and in our third and final match we met ‘the man with the hammer’; we lost our game. As this was our final game and we had no chances of survival our tournament was finished. Luckily the beers from the treasurer were a

small ray of light on this dark day. Due to the fact we had to wait quite some time for the barbecue to start, we enjoyed ourselves with some more beer and, of course, another game of football. After we feasted upon the blackened waste meat we went back to Rotterdam.

Oh well, it was really quite nice.

We had a cheerful, sportsmanlike day and that’s what ultimately matters. The fact that we’ve still got ‘an apple to peel’ with Groningen will come in due time, maybe when we will get the honor of organizing the LEVT. First things first: we really should go on a training camp for our own football tournament in May!

× Rik de Wilde

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Amsterdam trip

> On Saturday the 3rd of November, a group of us (first year International Bachelor Econometrics students) got a chance to visit one of the world’s most famous cities, one of the top financial centres in Europe, and the capital of the Netherlands: Amsterdam. We spent the whole day getting to know another side of the Dutch culture, including the traditional architecture- such as the historic canals and canal houses.

09

Photo made by Zejun Wang

Amsterdam trip The day in the city started off with a canal tour around 1pm. A short walk away from Amsterdam central station, our personal boat came to pick us up. It was well equipped with plenty of windows which would have offered a great view of the whole city as we cruised along the canals, had it not been raining. But despite the bad weather, most of us managed to enjoy the ride.

After about an hour the boat dropped us off near our lunch spot: a cosy restaurant which offered us a variety of tasty food choices. Once warmed up, fed and relaxed, we made our way to Dam Square to meet our tour guide. Our smiling guide provided us with more information about the history of Amsterdam, and

how certain things came to be.

Thankfully it had stopped raining around this time and the sun began to shine a little, making our walk around the city significantly better. During the tour we made short stops at

Next, there was a period of a little more than an hour where we had free time and could go explore the city by ourselves.

Some people chose to walk around, others decided to shop for souvenirs and a group went to

We got acquainted with the most renowned tourist spots famous places like the red light district, Amsterdam’s Chinatown, and Anne Frank’s house, where our tour guide would tell us a little about the history of that area and then we would move on.

So in about two hours we got acquainted with the most renowned tourist spots and their backgrounds.

sit in a café to warm themselves.

This was before we all met and headed to an Italian restaurant to have dinner. The meal involved many pizzas and pastas which we enjoyed in each other’s company.

After satisfying our appetites, it was time to head back to Rotterdam, although a few of us stayed behind to have some

drinks. And so the eventful day came to an end.

Our trip to Amsterdam was very enjoyable and we got to learn new things about the largest city in the Netherlands. Hopefully the boat ride and tour were part of the first to come of many more city trips. As we spend the next three years doing our bachelors at Erasmus, it would be nice to further explore this wonderful country that we are living in and discover all that it has to offer. x Arisha Akhtar

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10 case choice

case choice marketing

> MICompany

We began the afternoon with a nice lunch. The people of MICompany were spread in the lunchroom, so that every student had a chance to get to know MICompany a little bit better or get a first impression. After the lunch we got a short introduction talk about the company. Then the group was split in two and it was time to get to the case. The case was presented shortly and then we were supposed to get to work.

In the case we had to solve the problem in what kind of advertising a particular firm has to invest with only a budget of 1 million euros. MICompany acted very professional like you were actually working for a company and finally we had to present our solutions. To make it more exciting the groups were

competing for a prize. The case was won by Mats, Bob and Koen.

For the people that could not join this case, they still had a chance to talk to MICompany at the social drink. This was a great end to an interesting day.

“We had to solve the problem in what kind of advertising a particular firm has to invest.”

x Daisy van Oostrom

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case choice

11

Cmotions

>>

The first impression of the day was the well prepared lunch, where most people knew how to entertain themselves. The ice was already breaking between the students and the companies.

You’ve got the opportunity to get to know the people of Cmotions without all those formalities.

After the lunch, everyone was escorted to the room to continue with the program.

At first a general presentation was given by Kees Groenewoud, the owner of Cmotions. It was nice to see how the business is running at Cmotions and to know which possibilities you have there. After the general presentations, everyone was divided over the two different rooms and the case could begin.

The case of Cmotions was about how the energy suppliers can prevent their customers to switch to another supplier. It was

different from what people are used to, but still very interesting and informative. You’ve got a lot of feedback on the assignments that often were presented by Ton Kuijlen. Besides working at Cmotions, he is also a professor at the University of Tilburg and we got along. After the case you could enjoy an informal drink so you got to know the companies better, but also the people that belong to a company. This is in my opinion the best completion of such an educational day.

x Mariam Petrosyan

“The ice was already breaking between the students and the companies.”

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12 adventures of the 47

th

board

Adventures th of the 47 board After a nice holiday in which two of us, the president and me, participated in the research trip to Brasil, which was really interesting, fun and above all very exciting, we could finally act as the 47th board in the new college year. We both missed Pinkwin, the introduction camp for the dutch freshmen econometrician because of this trip, which was a real pity, because it is always fun to be there. It is a shame we missed Harry’s BBQ and his stories.

Fortunately, we were both back in time to take part in the international introduction camp, Penguin, which is confusingly named like Pinkwin. During this event the Internationals had a way to get used to the city Rotterdam and its highlights, but more important to us promising econometricians. Dutch beers made for a good time during the night and games such as table tennis and card games got played all day long, which was a nice way of getting to know each other. We got lucky that the living legend Harry had some spare time to feed our stomachs with proper meat and tasty corn.

We are truly happy that he was there to guide us.

Next monday party time was over and classes started again. New adventures were on the rise.

Both international and national First year day took place. It is a tradition to go bowling and eatpizza afterwards. We continued this lasting tradition.

Our first social drink was held on another location, Café Oost. Here we could shine as a board in our new grey vest. One could definitely say that a big crowd showed up at this social event.

Later on in September we as a board held our constitution drink.

Committees and other study associations were welcome to visit us with our constitution. We got some nice presents. The moving monkey, which the law study association gave us, was by far the most entertaining one. I had amused myself with this monkey the whole evening until some people got jealous and wanted to have a part of this monkey. I had no other choice than to give them a little piece of it. Some still have a foot or an arm. The next day we got a new one and until this day it is present at our ED-office at H10-05. Anyone who is willing to get a glimpse of this monkey is welcome. No touching is allowed.

In English you could call him

cute, in Spanish one could say that he is very “tierno”. I would call him very “schattig”.

stories for the day after.

Unfortunately someone still has the photos.

Not only our own drinks can bring us joy, but other drinks and parties as well. Some constitution drinks are excellent opportunities to chat, cheer and drink. Others do not last so long because of lack of organisation.

For me personally two nights stand out. The night in which the constitution drink of our history colleagues was a big mess and led us to the party of JFR, the law study association. Here were many board members of other study associations present and partying gave us some nice

Differently was the constitution drink at the MFVR, which is the study association for the future doctors. This board had stolen several items at other constitution drinks and had prepared itself big time at their own drink. They formed a big committee which they called ‘PIKCIE’ to defend their properties. These people had trouble smiling and were not that much fun. They were kind of hostile and wanted to touch you all over in case you were not a Medicine student. This committee which consisted out of more

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adventures of the 47 th board

than thirty members guided their board members to the toilet and maybe inspected their urine as well. It was still good fun to disrupt their drink as much as possible. There were rumours that an insider stole their flag for a while and that someone got a present of theirs in another room, but that he did not want to take the effort to hand in a handwritten letter with demands.

This event was organized at Beurs, so unsurprisingly the DJ asked : “Zijn hier nog Geneeskundestudenten in de zaal?”

Next to the fun events, there are also events in which the focus is

“Become active and have a blast in your study period in Rotterdam!” more serious. Several companies organize events directed at board members of study-/ student associations. Until now I only went to one of these events, namely to a board day of one of the big four accountancy firms. In this day Robin van Gaalen, the coach of the women water polo team, which won gold in the Olympics of Beijing, gave a motivational speech about personal leadership. He showed us how he guided his chicks to

their triumph. It was quite impressive the way in which he told about their choices, struggles and development in the process to the Olympics.

Furthermore we had a work shop about the subject personal development and a boat tour back to Amsterdam central station. It is always nice to be on a boat in Amsterdam.

Another activity we undertook as a board was at ORMIT. Over there

13

>>

we reflected mostly our recent board experiences and the way in which we cooperated. It is interesting to note how other people see you and what aspects they do or do not appreciate of you.

I would like to conclude this article by highlighting the opportunities, fun and learning moments you get as an active member or board member of the Econometric Study Association.

So become active and have a blast in your study period in Rotterdam! x Bert Wassink

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14 Alumnus tells

Alumnus tells After last years success, this year there was a sequel to Alumnus tells. Here we get a sample from all possible econometric walks of life and the almuni tell how their careers are unfolding.

>

Optiver First Hans Hakkenberg from Optiver told us about the career opportunities from the Quantitative Finance perspective.

After working for RBS for 1,5 year he now works as a screen trader for Optiver in Amsterdam.

Optiver is an international proprietary trading firm, which means they trade with their own capital, at their own risk. Their goals are market making and providing liquidity to the financial markets. As a screen trader you spot the current opportunities by pricing and trading financial options. A typical day of a trader starts at 08:00 when you prepare yourselves with your team for the coming trading day, so you’ll know what news is coming up.

Then the stock exchange opens at 09:00 and the trading begins!

In the late morning/early afternoon the stock market slows down a bit and you can get your lunch or work on improving your

trading strategies and models.

Then, at around 15:30, the pace of the stock markets increases with the opening of the stock exchanges in America. At 17:30 the Dutch stock exchange closes and with your team you evaluate the day. The job is high-paced, dynamic and you will work with over 35 nationalities. For more information, keep an eye on their website, www.optiver.com. Every year in May, Optiver organises a two-day masterclass for students who want to start their career in trading.

PhD Secondly, the opportunities at our own university were shown with an explanation of becoming a PhD by Victor Hoornweg. How can you become a PhD? You can do this by writing at least four papers in four years (full time) and following different courses at a research institute, or you do a research masters degree and then you are able to get a PhD in three years. A nice aspect of

doing a PhD is that you travel quite a lot to foreign countries to present your work. Also, when doing research you can have a discussion with your professor because there are many ways to look at one problem. For example, a priori and a posteriori. Let us compare this with throwing a dice. When you measure a priori you will say that the chance of throwing 1 out of the 6 sides is 1 out of 6. Whereas a posteriori means that you first throw the dice thousands of times and then calculate the probabilities of throwing a one, for example. Because up front you cannot know whether the dice is fair. This way you can doubt almost every assumption around you and these ways of thinking can make a PhD very interesting. Three tips Victor wanted to give away are the following: 1) If you want to start a company, do it now. As a student you have no family yet, you are flexible and

you can use a lot of recources at the university.

2) Have experiences abroad, this widens your world and a good way to explore the world is with the use of AIESEC programmes.

3) Be critical on the articles that you receive. Why is that important?

Compare it with looking at a piece of art. If you look at it while naming all the objects of the piece of art it is boring. However, if you think about associations between objects in a painting you will use your brain much more.

To conclude his talk Victor said: ‘Everyone can become a PhD, you only need a lot of motivation.”

Ortec Logistics Up next was Maarten Peekstok from Ortec Logistics. He started his study of Econometrics in 1998 and graduated for a Msc in logistics in 2003. Now he is a senior software engineer at Ortec Logistics. Ortec Logistics is a

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alumnus tells

consultancy bureau that solves complex logistical problems.

Problems like, how can you load as much weight or space in the right order in large good-trains?

How can you optimally make a schedule for all your employees?

What is the best route to drive to make sure that all the roads are covered in salt when it freezes?

As a consultancy company, you will be involved in multiple projects at different companies that require solutions and optimizations in their businesses.

The time that projects last can vary a lot, from just lasting a month up to a year. As consultancy companies have many clients that they cooperate with, most of the time you hear about people that wear a suit, yet because logistics is a more hands-on part you will not have to wear a suit all the time. Maarten started at Ortec as a student, and so can you! You could for example write your masters thesis at Ortec or work as a student assistant. For

>> more information check www. ortec.nl/studenten

MICompany

improve and evaluate. On these projects you work with a team that consists of 1 or 2 analysts, a project leader and a partner that keeps an eye on the situation.

MICompany analyses the growth opportunities of companies and does not only do the analysis, but also translates it into business potential. MICompany works with big companies such as Microsoft, Nivea, NS and the Postcode Lottery. When you work at MICompany you can schedule your own hours and you will probably work not much more than 40 hours excluding travel time to and from work. Tasks MICompany can get are, how can we get more people to use our product? What are the best products we can offer as a transport company? Where is the growth potential for this service and how can we target those people?

All are very interesting and challenging problems and MICompany has been handling them all very succesfully.

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afternoon and the exchange of contact information at the social drink was a good sign. It was another success and we cannot wait for the next ‘Alumnus Tells’, next year. x Emiel Verhaert

Veneficus Finally it was up to one of the co-founders of Veneficus to show what you can do as an entrepre-

“The right time is now and in order to be successful, you have to be determined.”

Now it was time for another Econometric discipline, marketing. Ilya Petoukhov from MICompany came from Amsterdam to show one of the many possibilities of the Marketing direction in Econometrics. He works as a senior market intelligence analist at MICompany, and as a student he also has been the chairman of the 39th board of the ED. What attracted MICompany to him is the fact that it is a very young company with a lot of potential. At MICompany a project typically lasts from 1,5 to 3 months. After this time they

neur. He and his friends started a company from their dorm room and after succesfully completing the first few tasks, they found out that there was a lot of potential to grow and they made their mission to conquer the world.

What they do is assisiting companies with the making of strategic decisions, by analyzing data and using econometric models. He said that if you wanted to start a company, the right time is now and in order to be successful, you have to be determined.

All in all, it was a very interesting

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16 policy

beleidsrede Onderstaande beleidsrede is gepresenteerd op de Wisselings Algemene Leden Vergadering van 6 september 2012 door Christiaan Lensvelt > Geachte ALV, Bij deze wil ik u graag informeren over het te volgen beleid zoals opgesteld door het 47e bestuur van het Econometrisch Dispuut.

Vooraleer ik dit doe, zou ik graag alle voorgaande besturen, commissies en leden willen bedanken voor de moeite en tijd die ze in de vereniging hebben gestoken en de vereniging zo gevormd hebben zoals het op vandaag de dag is.

Verder zijn we extra dankbaar aan het 46e bestuur, voor hun inzet, voor het toevoegen van verscheidene projecten en voor het succesvol voortzetten van reeds bestaande evenementen.

Van de huidige projecten streven wij ernaar om ze allen te continueren. Bij nieuwe projecten zoals iCansultancy is er verder nog ruimte voor uitbreiding over wat wij zeker willen benutten. Dit zullen we onder andere proberen door extra aandacht te besteden aan de data waarop deze evenementen worden gehouden.

Inhousedagen en de Case Choice zullen logischerwijs ook blijven worden georganiseerd, net zoals de vele bekende sociale gelegenheden zoals de aftertentamenborrels. Sommige projecten zullen echter aan verandering on-

derhevig zijn. Alhoewel QFP 2012 momenteel goed verloopt met zes banken, lijkt het erop dat we voor het daaropvolgende Quantitative Finance Project een geduchte concurrent tegemoet gaan met het komen van een gelijke banking-tour georganiseerd door de overige econometrie verenigingen in Nederland. Om ons mannetje te blijven staan dienen we een strakke planning qua acquisitie voor de volgende QFP gereed te hebben.

Het SPED is ook aan verandering toe; waar afgelopen jaar nog als overgangsfase de SPED tijdens het werkcollege werd gehouden zal dat nu tijdens de minor zijn, aan het begin van het derde Bachelorjaar. Dit houdt in dat de SPED-commissie anderhalf jaar lang aanblijft en dat de commissie uit tweedejaarsstudenten zal bestaan. Om leden vroeg enthousiast te maken voor de stages maar ook voor de studiereis die pas anderhalf jaar later zal plaatsvinden willen we de be-

Due to the language spoken on the G.M.A., this article unfortunately is only being presented in Dutch.

kendmaking wederom via een borrel doen met behulp van een videoclip met beelden van de meest recente studiereis naar BraziliĂŤ.

moeten internationaliseren. De site is al in het Engels net zoals onze functies, maar verder zal de mailing tweetalig worden, en ook de Estimator zal voor een deel

If there is a major change in the 47th year of life of the association, it would come from the start of Econometrics.

Als er ergens echter een grote verandering schuilt in het 47e levensjaar van de vereniging, is dat wel de komst van Econometrics.

Het Engelstalige broertje van Econometrie ziet dit collegejaar eindelijk het daglicht wat voor het Econometrisch Dispuut een golf van verandering met zich meebrengt. Alhoewel de lichting maar 41 man groot is en eerstejaars studenten nog niet op elk niveau actief kunnen zijn binnen het Econometrisch Dispuut, betekent dit alsnog dat wij als vereniging meteen onze modus operandi

Engels worden. Er wordt een Freshman-committee in het leven geroepen, wat parallel aan het EC zou opereren en verscheidene introductionele activiteiten voor de Internationals zal organiseren.

Men kan denken aan tripjes naar Amsterdam, de Zaanse Schans en andere sociale gelegenheden. De internationale tak van Econometrie is een heuse toevoeging aan het Econometrisch Dispuut en wij zullen er alles voor doen om te zorgen dat deze met gepaste zorg wordt opgepakt.

Verder zal het takenpakket van

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policy

>>

het EC lichtelijk worden omgegooid. Zo zal het jaarlijkse EDweekend, wat afgelopen jaar uitgegroeid is tot heuse stedentrip en onder ons op dergelijke grootte zal blijven, uit hun takenpakket wegvallen. Deze verantwoordelijkheid zal gelegd worden bij een nieuw te vormen commissie, de Activities-committee, die zich verder met het GALA en eventueel Comedy Night bezig zou houden.

De Estimator zal wel veranderen qua inhoud wat betreft de taal, maar verder zullen er wederom vier edities uitkomen. Het aantal MET-uitgaves zal echter teruggeschroefd worden. Alhoewel we blij moeten zijn dat het ED als studievereging een publicatie van dermate hoog niveau uitgeeft, is dit blad ieder jaar een heikel punt. De vier publicaties per jaar worden niet behaald, de commissie is vaak moeilijk te vullen en ook financieel gezien heeft het ED weinig baat bij het MET. Desondanks is de prestige van

het MET en ook de uitstraling naar het Econometrisch Instituut en bedrijven dermate belangrijk dat het MET gecontinueerd moet worden. We willen dit echter te-

focussen op studenten aan de Erasmus Universiteit.

Verder is te merken dat printed media minder aandacht krijgt dan voorheen door de komst van sociale media. De vernieuwing van de site ectrie.nl afgelopen jaar is daarom een belangrijke stap geweest. Verder is het intensievere gebruik van Facebook een gouden manier om gemakkelijk en snel veel leden aan te spreken, iets wat wij zeker zullen doorzetten.

Als laatste willen wij graag de vacaturesite van het Econometrisch Dispuut, econometrie.com ook van een metamorfose voorzien.

Dit is enkele jaren terug ook getracht, en alhoewel de functionaliteiten het goed doen ziet de site er verouderd en niet erg aantrekkelijk uit. Een modernere site zou niet alleen voor onze leden maar ook voor bedrijven positief uitpakken.

Naast de BETA zal een ander nieuw project worden opgestart waarbij we verscheidene kleinere bedrijfsgerelateerde evenementen een collectieve noemer geven, te weten EDucation. Hierbij kan gedacht worden aan evenementen die een praktischere insteek hebben met wat minder nadruk op recruitment. Hierbij kan ge-

Als er ergens echter een grote verandering schuilt in het 47e levensjaar van de vereniging,

is

dat

wel

de

komst

van

Econometrics.

rugschroeven naar twee normale edities en een speciale derde editie die draait om de scripties die genomineerd zijn voor de BETA. De BETA is de Best Econometric Thesis Award die dit jaar georganiseerd gaat worden voor de beste masterscriptie, gekozen door leden van het Econometrisch Instituut. Het is de bedoeling dit op langer termijn uit te breiden tot een landelijk evenement, maar dit jaar zullen we ons

 17

door het 46ste al in beweging is gezet met het bijwonen van het Management Team overleg.

Naast dit gaan we het Econometrisch Instituut assisteren in het organiseren van een Logistiek Congres in september 2013 en gaan we uiteraard proberen dit jaar een voor hen probleemloze SPED te organiseren.

Al met al hopen we een steeds meer te integreren als individuele faculteitsvereniging binnen de ESE. Als laatste zou ik graag de uitstraling van het Econometrisch Dispuut willen bespreken. Wij willen als bestuur extra nadruk leggen op een moderner jasje voor het ED en ons meer profileren als een professionele vereniging. Om dit te bewerkstelligen willen we meer tijd en geld uit trekken voor promotie, zowel binnen het ED en de faculteit met behulp van posters en flyers, als op de universiteit door middel van meer campus-presence. We zijn een faculteitsvereniging van formaat en daar mogen we trots op zijn, en dat mogen we laten zien.

Ik kijk er zeer naar uit mijn functie te mogen beoefenen en me komend jaar voor het Econometrisch Dispuut in te zetten. Ik zou graag de ALV willen bedanken voor het vertrouwen dat het ons als 47e bestuur toedeelt. x Christiaan Lensvelt President Econometrisch Dispuut 2012-2013

dacht worden aan sollicitatietraining, reken-training of een sportief recruitment uitje. De evenementen worden los van elkaar georganiseerd met als raakvlak de praktische aard.

Apart van de evenementen die we komend jaar zullen organiseren heeft het ED natuurlijk met meer facetten te maken. Zo willen we de band tussen het universiteit en het Econometrisch Dispuut versterken, een opwaartse trend die

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18 photo´s > And he scored! > tekst ×

>>

> People are having a good time on the train.

> All the party people in the house!

> Thinking about the meaning of life.

> Some serious work is being done at the Case Choice.

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photo´s

19

> Ready for Hawaiï

>> > Some of the First Years committee is present on the social drink.

> Well played...

> Enjoying a nice view in Brazil. > The weather wasn’t very appealing.

> The subway seems to be hilarious.

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20 penguin

“It was inevitable that friendships would form.”

From Friday the 31st of August until Sunday September 2nd was the infamous Penguin weekend of 2012; the introduction weekend for all International Econometrics students. After settling in at the scouting association where the weekend took place, it was time for the future classmates to get to know each other.

PENGUIN > The first step of this process involved ice breaking games for everyone to learn each other’s names. After everyone was acquainted, an alternative version of bingo was introduced.

This version involved a variety of questions ranging from “What is your favourite movie?” to “What is your favourite sex position?” which revealed a lot (perhaps too much) about those participating in the weekend.

Since the weekend was organized for international students, it made sense to introduce them to

some Dutch culture. In teams, they battled to be the fastest in koekhappen (eating cake off a string), spijkerpoepen (aiming a nail strung around your waist inside of a bottle), bliklopen (walking on tin cans, which unfortunately broke under pressure) and snoephappen (fishing candy out of a bucket of water). Not only fun to do, but especially fun to watch. After dinner, the bachelors were put to the test with a pub quiz about Dutch culture and the internationals strategically paired up with

the Dutch among them.

On Saturday, the students were taken to Erasmus to explore their future campus and went on a pub crawl around Rotterdam. In groups, they crawled from Club BED to Café de Witte Aap to Café de Doelen where they wrote a rap about the superiority of their group. It turns out that these econometricians have more swag than you would expect.

With evenings spent playing poker, foosball, charades, ping pong, beer pong, King’s Cup and what not, it was inevitable that

friendships would form, and despite of how little they may remember of that weekend, they all know they had a blast.

x Wendelien Bakelaar

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pinkwin

>>

> After a long and joyful holiday, on the 14th of August it was finally time for what was promising to be a fantastic week.

The weather was lovely and the PINKWIN of 2012 was a fact for our new first years econometricians.

Pinkwin When the whole group had arrived at the hostel and everybody had chosen their beds, it was time to get to know each other, starting with their names.

Therefore, we played games.

Those ended a little before planned, so a lot of people went to play soccer afterwards and others just sat down to chat with one another. But all this excitement also caused some hunger and luckily Harry had made us a nice dinner. When all stomachs were filled, it was time to build rafts (and to fare with them of course). The people of the last finishing raft would have to clean the toilets and due to this, a lot of rafts were ruined on the water. Luckily, nobody was wounded and when everybody was clean again it was time to

play some card games and to drink beer.

The next day however, it was time for some serious business.

We went to visit Ortec, so the first years would see what they can actually do with their study econometrics. And although it was quite late the night before, most people could concentrate quite well. After this interesting presentation, Ortec offered us a lunch and we could talk with some people about the company and the presentation. In the afternoon we played another game, called crazy 88, which resulted in some funny pictures.

After dinner, we played some hints and that game was followed by a late night with games and beers again.

21

And again, everybody needed to get up early, because today we were going to the university where Mr. Brinkhuis would give us a lecture so the students would know a little bit what they could expect in university. This

quickly and after a very late night with not so much beer (we ran out of beer around two o’clock), it was time to clean the hostel and to go back home. We can all look back on a very successful week! x Marijtje van Leeuwen

“Unfortunately, the time went by quickly.” lecture was quite challenging, especially with such a lack of sleep. After this lecture it was time for a pub-crawl, though it was just past one o’clock. While we were in the city, back in the hostel a barbeque was prepared!

And that is always an omen for a good night, which it definitely turned out to be.

Unfortunately, the time went by

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22 econometrical

Experimental approximations of Pi > Throughout the years many methods have been developed, with increasing precision, to approximate the mathematical constant pi.

Since pi is an irrational number, which has been proven in 1761 by the Swiss scientist Johann Heinrich Lambert, it will always be possible to make a more precise approximation of pi.

There are several experimental

methods to approximate this mathematical constant. These experimental methods won’t beat the iterative algorithms to approximate pi, but that doesn’t make them less interesting.

Most experiments are the result of a problem introduced by the 18th century Frenchman Georges-Louis Leclerc, also known as Georges Buffon since he was the Count of Buffon. The problem is as follows: “Suppose a needle is thrown at random on a floor marked with equidistant paralell lines. What is the probability that the needle will land on one of the lines?”. Buffon originally used a baguette on a

>>

plank floor for this problem, but then he figured a needle on a checkerboard would be more convenient. Since this probability has something to do with the angle of the needle, it makes sense that this probability should involve pi in some way. On the internet many forms of this experiment can be found. For example throwing frozen hotdogs around the kitchen or throwing matches on a piece of paper. I chose a convenient way of

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econometrical

performing the experiment, namely with matches. I drew equidistant paralell lines on a cardboard, with the distance between two lines being the length of two matches. Then I randomly distributed 120 matches in the cardboard, and counted the amount of matches that crossed a line. I repeated the above 10 times and found out that a total of 384 matches had crossed a line. So my approximation of the probability that a match crosses a line equals , which is very close to

23

Following the same reasoning, the uniform probability density function of equals:

Since and are independent, the joint probability density function equals:

Now we can compute the probability that a line is crossed:

.

The derivation of the answer to Buffon’s problem depends on the distance between two lines. I have chosen to show the result for the case when this distance is equal to or longer than the length

This is the answer to Buffon’s problem. Then

. In my experiment with the 120 matches, equals 2 so that . Then an approximation of

“What is the probability that the needle will land on one of the lines?” of the object which is used to perform the experiment, in my experiment a match.

Let be the angle made by the needle and an imaginary line parallel to the drawn lines, as shown in figure 1. Then a needle will cross a line if the distance from the nearest line to the center of the match, which equals in figure 1, is shorter than the length of the side opposite to . This happens when . In order to solve the problem we need to define the probability density functions of and . Since the angle can take any value between 0 and with equal probability, it follows that the uniform probability density function of equals:

can be made by dividing the number of matches used over the number of matches that cross a line, which is equal to .This is only 0.53% smaller than , which I find very reasonable for this sample size.

Using the answer to Buffon’s needle problem, a more precise approximation of can be made using a Monte Carlo simulation with a large amount of needles. x Jelle Huisman

Georges-Louis Leclerc, also known as Georges Buffon

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24 SPED

In the summer of 2011, when I was on vacation with my parents in Latvia and Estonia, It came to my mind that I would like to visit some country outside of Europe for once. I also found it disappointing that I could not join my classmates on their SPED

SPED

in 2010 because I had some study delay. This way I chose to apply for the SPED-commission 2012. After some texting, talking and applying I was accepted in November. Unfortunately I was the only member who showed interest in organizing this project. along.

SPED-commisary Manon and me were a tough So faced there with we were, the chalfirst half of the year had passed and we still lenge: try to acquire at least ten research positions at different did not have any research companies in Holland for a not too shabby compensation. projects and the commission was > We started by launching a website and attracting participators. The applications went well and we learned a lot. Everybody we interviewed was good enough to be a potential candidate and so we actually needed 16 research positions, eight in finance, four in marketing and four in logistics, to be able to let everyone come

extremely ambitious and supportive, Josephine Boerman dared to take on the task of helping me besides her other tasks as a board member. We got

“The fun part of the SPED-project started as the research projects were taking place and we could start organizing a trip to Brazil.” facing tough times. Fortunately, the 46th board of last year, was

a big list of 500 companies and just started calling them from A to Z. Later we found out the ED holds even more heroes in its ranks, namely Christiaan Lensvelt. He had been on exchange to Shanghai in the first half of the year and wanted to join SPED nonetheless. He offered to help in the organization.

So we got to it, day in, day out to acquire the researches. We visited companies to explain them what we could mean for them and find out what they

wanted. In the end we managed to acquire eight research positions, which was enough to continue on the SPED adventure.

Lisanne van Nes of the 46th also joined us from this point to help while Christiaan and me had to do the research.

Now the fun part of the SPEDproject started, as the research projects themselves were taking place and we could start organizing a three week trip to Brazil. I was, as a marketing major, assigned to go to the Cool House of Financial Media N.V. to research the Dutch economy as a whole. This young company had gathered a lot of survey-data via their website and they wanted to use this data to make indicators or so-called “barometers” for the Dutch economy. This challenging task came out to be out to be too big of a task for a two-month project, but we helped them get started at least. All the expected correlations were there, for example the positive correlation

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SPED

 25

>> between income and education. I will not go deep into the research projects here and if you want to know more about them, just visit the ED-room at H10.

After the research projects it was time for a bit of leisure, a three week trip to Soa Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and the jungle of Brazil!

This was not just partying, because lessons had to be

learned on this study trip. That is why we visited a number of companies, such as ING and VOPAK. It was a great trip and we learned a lot about the Brazilian economy. Did you know it’s the world 3rd largest economy only after China and the U.S.?

Despite all frustrations, bad luck

and hard work, it was a project to never forget. Without the help of the 46th board, Christiaan and all participants, this project would have never been possible.

Thanks for everything!

organising or participating in SPED in the future, because this is something you do not want to miss!

x Hendrik Grondijs BSc. Econometrie & Operationele Research P.S.: I hope I made the reader enthousiastic to apply for

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26 W.A.L.V.

W.A.L.V.

On the 6th of September it was time for the official installation of the current board at the General Members Assembly (G.M.A./A.L.V.) that was held in the society of S.S.R.-Rotterdam.

The meeting was scheduled to start at 21:00, however due to the flexible student planning the G.M.A. started almost half past

The new board was grilled by the members present at the W.A.L.V.

nine. As noted in the minutes of the generals members assembly, the assembly started on the 6th of September at 21:28 and with breaks in between lasted until the 7th of September at 14:32. > The previous board year had been summarized, also, the new board was presented and they were grilled by the members.

From how they were going to handle challenging projects and translation challenges up to how many women they were planning to pick up and how the budget has been established. After all the questions were handled correctly, it was time to discharge the 46th board and install the 47th board. The previous president, Remco Mol, started with the discharge of the commissioner of commercial matters, Sabine den Daas. He expressed praise for her work and she was discharged with full honours. Up next was the discharge of Lisanne van Nes, the commissioner of company

projects. Remco Mol will always remember how positive she is at every moment and he could not imagine the past year without her. Then she was discharged with full honours. Josephine Boerman, Remco stated that, even though his expectations were very high, Josephine has met his expectations. He also expressed praise for the new ICansultancy project and that she can take place in the board of commissioners. Then Josephine Boerman was discharged with full honours. Kit Lee was next.

Remco stated that the fellow members of his society see him as a boss. Though he doubted about that, now he can certainly agree with that. Kit Lee then was discharged with full honours.

Now it was time for the last

discharge that Remco could do, which was for the secretary, Rik de Wilde. Remco explains that in the beginning of the year things were done that could not be tolerated by daylight and is very delighted that everything has come together in a good way.

Remco then discharged Rik de Wilde with full honours.

Now Remco wanted to install Roman Gorlov as Commercial Officer. Roman Gorlov was then installed full of confidence for the future and it was up to Roman to discharge the last member of the 46th board. Roman discharged Remco Mol with full honours and then one by one, the new members of the 47th board were being installed full of confidence for the future. These now are, in order of installation: Christiaan Lensvelt as president, Jelle Lock as secretary, Bert Wassink as treasurer, Robin van Straalen as career officer, Tjian Lam as educational officer and

Ruud van Luijk as marketing officer.

The assembly then was suspended and it was time to celebrate the discharges with full honours and the installations full of confidence for the future.

After a great night of going out, all the board members were hungover the next morning when the assembly was reopened.

Several items were discussed and the G.M.A. closed at 14:28. x Emiel Verhaert

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Schiphol Airport tour

27

Schiphol Tour

titel

Well over 50 milion people have travelled from Schiphol airport just last year alone. Air travel from Schiphol is probably a very common event for most of us. You leave your luggage at either Departures 1 or 2, or, if you’re lucky and you will be travelling to an intercontinental destination, Departures 3. After that comes queuing for customs, some shopping, boarding your plane, flying

Not only do the pieces of luggave have to

to your destination, picking up your luggage there and having

find the correct aircraft, they also have to

fun for your time being there. It all seems very normal, but only > Tekst × a small amount of people realize the logistic nightmares behind

be there in time and in a certain order.

your flight...

> Over 75 million pieces of luggage alone have to find the right aircraft every year, and that is just luggage, I did not even mention cargo, and not only do they have to find the correct aircraft, they also have to be there in time and in a certain order: transferring passengers as well as business class passengers need their luggage first at arrival, so it gets in loaded last. Also, some transfer passengers will have to wait for up to 24 hours for their next flight, during that time they are not allowed to get luggage for

security reasons, so during those 24 hours, what to do with this luggage? In order to get every piece of luggage and every piece of cargo in time to the right destination, you will have to organize this in an extremely complex way.

As a reward for winning a case given by Schiphol Group a group of 5 students including me were allowed to have a look on how this works. This would be a rare opportunity for anyone: Schiphol has one of the most sophisticated security systems in the world and

any knowledge on how the security systems work is for obvious reasons confidential.

Nevertheless we were allowed to pass and see it with our own eyes: we got to see how automatic cars filled with suitcases that race around an enormous basement, how suitcases travel around on conveyors with speeds of up to 80 km/h and how everything was in time, with almost optimal efficiency. Unfortunately due to security reasons we were only rarely allowed to take pictures, but every time I will have to fly in

the future from Schiphol I will picture myself how my suitcase travels with 80 km/h through the basement of Schiphol, just underneath all the shops and beneath the aprons on which the planes are being refueled.

We want to thank Schiphol Group for this interesting day!

Regards, x Sander Monster

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28 Drinks

drinks

Opening Drink > After tekst a × long and hard-earned vacation, it was finally time for another ED-drink on Thursday the 13th of September. The opening drink is the ideal occasion to meet up with fellow econometricians and discuss the summer in detail. The drink was most certainly fun, also because of the large number of first year students, both Dutch and international, that showed up.

With a new year belongs a new location for the ED-drinks. This is what the fresh ED-board must have thought, because instead of the familiar Villa Kakelbont, Café Oost on the Oostzijdijk is the new host of the drinks. Fortunately, it was noticeable that not many econometricians made the mistake of going to the wrong location. It was a busy drink from the start, especially because of the first year’s day, which was held prior to the opening drink.

However, it did not take too long for senior students to arrive.

The weather was reasonable and with so many guests, the drink’s atmosphere was great. This is why the drinking bill already closed at a record-breaking time of around 10.30 (!!!). This made the night particularly expensive, since over two euros now had to be paid for a beer or wine. But that most definitely did not impact the good atmosphere, as holiday stories and study prospects continued to be cheerfully exchanged.

For many econometricians, this Thursday became a very long night. It was obvious that some people started to feel the effects of that. So after hours and hours of drinking with fellow students, econometricians slowly started to go home. Others planned to continue drinking in the city centre. Overall, the ED opening drink was very enjoyable and unquestionably provided a good taste of what’s to come this year. x Sierk Wiegers

28

Cobo > The opening drink was not the only ED party in the first block.

On the 26th of September, active ED committee members and board members of other study associations celebrated the constitution of the 47th board of the Econometrisch Dispuut. All the ingredients to a good party were there: lots of guests, lots of presents and lots of beer…

As early as nine o’clock, guests

board members have a solid recollection of the night. This is undoubtedly true of some of the other visitors as well.

Overall, the night had not too many incidents. Only on two occasions did a follow board try to steal one of the ED artefacts.

But thanks to all the econometrician heroes, the honour of the ED

was not arrived to celebrate the birth of a new board. As a tradition, each committee and fellow board brought a present. Each present is accompanied with a short speech, (although some of them may not be worth mentioning). To keep order in the chaos, a member of the former ED board had a big stick with her to beat on the ground. Part of that tradition is the announcement of the presenters of the present by writing down a message on a coaster. Unfortunately not all of the stories were quite audible.

It was a busy night and there was lots of drinking, especially for the newly installed board. The board had a constant and direct connection to the tap. After some hours the effects of that started to show. It is safe to say not many

lost. This night was a great celebration of the new board and makes us already looking forward at the Dies Natalis. Let’s hope the rest of the board’s term will be as cheerful and enjoyable as this night. x Sierk Wiegers

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29 puzzle

puzzle

29

Puzzle > We

have 2 mathematicians, A and B. We pick four (different)

numbers out of {1,2,…,9,10}. A and B both picked 4 numbers between 1-10, but they don’t know which. We add the numbers and tell A the result. Then we multiply the numbers and tell B the result. We put A and B together in a room but they are not allowed to share their given number. We ask them how many numbers they know.

A: I don’t know any number.

B: I now know one number.

A: I now know two numbers.

B: I now know all the numbers.

What are the numbers? ×

E-mail your answer to puzzel@ectrie.nl to win a prize! x Max Schotsman

VOLUME 15 ISSUE 1 // ESTIMATOR ECONOMETRISCH DISPUUT

30 chef

chef

Chef

30

Lensvelt

On November 1st, just before the first post-exam drink of the

year, the Estimator committee visited the president of the Econometrisch Dispuut. It wasn’t just like a meeting or something like that, no, Christiaan Lensvelt was going to cook for us. And

as it should for a dinner at the president of the ED, expectations were high.

>>

> When we arrived at the destination, preparations for dinner were still in full swing.

Since we were with ten men in total, this took quite some time and therefore we took something to drink first.

But while Koen, a very helpful roommate of Chris, was still cutting bell peppers, chef Lensvelt served our entree, asparagus soup. He didn’t have time to eat it himself however, because while we were enjoying the soup, Chris was preparing the meat for the main course.

For the main course, we had wraps, which tasted delicious. Of course, a lot of beer was consumed since we arrived, which resulted in a lot of interesting quotes now. We found out, for instance, that our

president doesn’t really like beer at half past six in the morning for some unbelievable reason.

Other things are perhaps better left untold. I can easily conclude that everybody

chocolate ice cream!?

All together it was a very successful evening with delicious food and lots of fun. And when dinner was over around half past

Naam: Christiaan Lensvelt Start year: 2009 Favourite dish: Carpaccio ED-highlight: SPED trip to Brazil

was enjoying their meal and the talk.

While we were all satisfied and very content, since the dinner was honestly delicious, chef Lensvelt had a very pleasant surprise for us. It turned out that he had made us a threecourse meal and it was time for the dessert. Everybody knows that the dessert is the most important part of every dinner and what is a better dessert than

nine, fun wasn’t over yet. It was time to go to the postexam drink, which was promising to be as much enjoyable as our president’s cooking skills. x Marijtje van Leeuwen×

VOLUME 15 ISSUE 1 // ESTIMATOR ECONOMETRISCH DISPUUT

32 studysection

opleidingsdirectie > Dear fellow students, There are a lot of things I would like to tell you in the first Estimator of this academic year! First of all, this will be my last column in the Estimator. After one and a half year I quit my position as student member of the Education Board. But you don’t have to be worried; my successor will provide you with these, as always, informative columns.

Even though the new academic year has been going on for a while, you should still notice the changes compared to the previous academic year; there is a new ED board, some educational changes are introduced, you (hopefully) follow new courses and there are new students.

Especially for the new students it is useful to know the purpose of this column: it is a way of keeping up with all the changes in Econometrics. I will now specify some useful things.

What do you think about the courses you follow(ed)? Do you have positive or negative comments? Let it be heard! The course evaluations are renewed this year, and a lot shorter than last year, so it will take less time to fill them in.

Every course has its own evaluation. The course evaluations consist of questions about the course itself, the course material, the study load, the lecturers and the examination. If you want your opinion about the examination to be heard, you should fill in the questionnaire after the examination.

The course evaluations are very important for the Education Board and also for the lecturers of the ESE. In the following year changes might be introduced to the course or the program, based on your comments. It is even possible that these changes become effective for other courses in the same year. So this is a great opportunity to tell us what you think about the education.

Besides the new course evaluations, the Education Service Center (ESC) has introduced something new: the webshop! Are you too late to register for an examination or a workgroup? One possibility is to do the registration at the helpdesk of the ESC at H6-02. But with the new webshop of the ESE, you can also do this registration online!

At the word ‘webshop’ you could be thinking about an online shop with all kinds of nice products. But the new webshop of the ESE is a ‘service shop’. All paid services of the ESC are offered in the webshop. So for example you can carry out a registration after the deadline has passed. You can find the webshop at: http://shop.ese.eur.nl. The rules, deadlines and prices are also specified on this website. Signing in on the webshop goes with your ERNA account. Also, you can still visit the ESC for questions or information.

I would like to end this column here and I wish you all good luck with the second block of this year!

x Merel Tilmans Student member of the Education Board Room: H06-1 E-mail: tilmans@ese.eur.nl

VOLUME 15 ISSUE 1 // ESTIMATOR ECONOMETRISCH DISPUUT

studysection

 33

opleidingscommissie > Dear fellow students, The first block of the new academic year has already ended and hopefully you are all satisfied with the results. We hope you have made a good new start in the second block, which ends in Christmas holidays! As information for our new students, the Education Committee helps to improve the quality of the programme where possible. For example, we evaluate the courses halfway through the block and try to make amendments if necessary.

In this year there have been a couple of big changes at the faculty. First of all we have welcomed the first group of students who follow the international Econometrics programme. This is a big milestone for the ESE. This year 41 students started in the international programme, half of whom are students from abroad. In the Dutch bachelor, approximately 175 students started this year. Another big change is the N=N rule which, as you probably already knew, means that the binding study advice is 60 ECTS. As Education Committee we will keep a close eye on how the new rule will work out.

With respect to the Education Committee we also had two changes. As Pauline Vermeer and Bas van der Noll have graduated, they left the Education Committee and their successors are Mechteld and John. Mechteld is in her second year and represents all second-year students and the first-year students of Econometrics. John is his third year and represents all third-year students and the first-year students of the Dutch programme Econometrie. Luuk represents the Master students.

On the 1st and 2nd of November a group of students received their Bachelors Degree on the Bachelor Graduation Day. We would like to congratulate them all and wish them luck with their next step in life! On this day Mr. Heij was announced to be the Lecturer of the Year 2012!

Congratulations on this special title and we hope this prize motivates lecturers even more.

You can always contact one of us if you have any questions, problems and/or suggestions. Together with all students and lecturers we hope to make this another successful, educative and fun year!

Luuk Maassen John Brouwer Mechteld Ferment Student members of the Education Committee Econometrics & Operational research Dr. C. Heij Dr. D. Fok Dr. W. van den Heuvel Staff members of the Education Committee Econometrics & Operational research Contact: oceconometrie@gmail.com x

VOLUME 15 ISSUE 1 // ESTIMATOR ECONOMETRISCH DISPUUT

34 studysection WE Congratulate all graduates!

29.08.12

Bouwman, K.E.

C. van der PLas

12.09.12

10.09.12

T. Boot

C. boon

Evolutionary Multi-Objective Optimi-

11.09.12

Breaking up with inflation

Mortgage Bucketing for Prepayment

zation and Preference Modeling in

T.E.M Klein Tank

Pick. A.

Prediction in Interest Rate Risk

Green Logistics

Forecasting the US Dollar/Euro

Tervonen, T.

Exchange Rate: The Economic Value

17.09.12

of The Economic Value of Combining

b.j Spruijt

29.08.12

Fundamentals, Technical Analysis,

A Nonlinear Approach to the Factor

10.09.12

A.C. Verheij

and Order Flow

Augmented Model: The FASTR Model

O.M. Gerritse

Improving Call Center Load Predic-

Dijk, D.J.C. van

Dijk, D.J.C. van

The Absence of Unspanned Stochas-

10.09.12

05.09.12

m. van der Houwen

E.I. de Kuiper

30.08.12

Introducing time dependent dyna-

Predicting Relative Sector Returns

17.09.12

B.J.D. Jacobs

mics in modeling the implied volati-

Using Dispersion in Valuation Ratios

N.M. Sonneveld

Promoting Latent Topic Models

lity surface

in Asia Paci c and Japan

Parameter stability in affine term

Extending LDA to account for promo-

Dijk, D.J.C. van

Diris, B.F.

structure models

analysis

12.09.12

18.09.12

Donkers, B.

R. de Vlaming

b. Kavi

20.09.12

Forecasting Advertisement Traffic

Optimizing the line-up: In soccer

M. de beus

04.10.12

Using forecast combinations to

with real-life data

Are Complex Correlation Models

O.K. Mierzwa

predict short time series data

Huisman, D.

Measuring Customer Sentiment on

Pick. A.

Management using Cluster Analysis Bouwman, K.E.

tion using News Tervonen, T.

tic Volatility Bouwman, K.E.

tional activities in shopping basket

Wel, M. van der

Twitter Velden, M. van de

Relevant for Risk Management?

Kole, H.J.W.G.

05.09.12 17.09.12

B. Chabok

11.09.12

S. Khazen

Hedging strategies for balance

F. Gresnigt

05.09.12

Modeling membership duration

sheet risks of a pension fund

Predicting the state of the stock

G.J.J. van den Burg

Fok, D.

Tham, W.W.

market using switching factors

Machine

12.09.12

13.09.12

Groenen, P.J.F.

M. Rijff

R.P.W. Oemraw

11.09.12

Operational Performance from a

On The Origin of Product Portfolios

R. van keeken

02.08.12

Passenger Perspective in the Airline

by means of an evolutionarty algo-

Predicting stock market cycles

B. Lips

Industry

rithim

Kole, H.J.W.G.

Time-Varying Volatility in the Dyna-

Fok, D.

Wagelmans, A.P.M.

20.09.12

30.08.12

j. Gimbrere

p.w.b. Timmermans

Q.C. ye

THE INFLUENCE OF TRADING VOLUME ON

18.09.12

Is gold a safe haven for investors?

The practical running time of some

IDENTIFYING AND PREDICTING BULL AND

J.J. van den Broek

Dijk, D.J.C. van

lot-sizing algorithms

BEAR MARKETS

Heuvel, van den W.

Kole, H.J.W.G.

A New Multiclass Support Vector

Kole, H.J.W.G.

mic Nelson-Siegel Model Wel, M. van der

31.08.12

HIGH FREQUENCY PAIRS TRADING USING U.S. EQUITIES

13.09.12

Tham, W.W.

c.j. van Dam

05.09.12

05.09.12

Modeling Mortgage Pipeline Risk

J.F.C. de Zegher

M.D. Skibinski

11.09.12

using Multinomial Logit Model and

Tail Risk: Implications for Portfolio

Hedge Fund Distinctiveness cute

H.M.C. Oudijk

Survival Analysis

Management

funds outperform

Risk management of corporate debt

Dijk, D.J.C. van

Diris, B.F.

Diris, B.F.

A cost approach

VOLUME 15 ISSUE 1 // ESTIMATOR ECONOMETRISCH DISPUUT

studysection

17.09.12

Dijk, D.J.C. van

L.H. Servanie

35 

28.08.12 l.f. Lee

24-10-2012

An internal risk model for man-

20.09.12

Fair Value Guarantee Contract: What

m. Keijzer

made catastrophe liability risk

M. Poelstra

are its sensitivities?

Hedging Currency Risk in Emerging

Tham, W.W.

Determine safety stocks for inven-

Bouwman, K.E.

Markets

tory systems in case of demands 10.09.12

B.R. jansen

Kole, H.J.W.G.

with large variance

28.08.12

Farenhorst-Yuan, T.

P.L. Oudshoorn

24-10-2012

How the available strike prices in

A. Jacobs

Optimal Multiperiod Portfolio Selection with Mean-Variance Utility

26.07.12

the option market affect option-im-

Optimisation of order picking in a

Bouwman, K.E.

S.P. Verloren van Themaat

plied volatilities and stock return

warehouse Ectrie

Daily Online Search Volume As A Time-

moments

Gabor, A.F.

12.09.12

ly Measure For Investor Attention:

Wel, M. van der

B.J.L. Keijsers

predicting daily abnormal returns.

Relating LGD for Bank Loans to the

Tham, W.W.

4-10-2012 29.08.12 G. Kalantzis

W. Kuijsten

Accelerating the Vlaue Iteration

Optimising the logistix capacity at

18.09.12

Algorithm on the Stochastic Eco-

refineries using ship arrival pat-

p.p.b Buuren van

nomic Lot Scheduling Problem for

terns

13.09.12

Solving large hub location pro-

Continuous Multi-Grade Production

Wagelmans, A.F.M.

F. Zandbergen

blems in express networks

Gabor, A.F.

Hedging Solvency II Interest Rate

Huisman, D.

State of the World Kole, H.J.W.G.

Risk

8-11-2012 31.08.12

s. Versendaal

23.08.12

A. Ruseckaite

How informative should a financial

a.z. Prajitno

Semi-Bayesian D-Optimal Choice

prospestus be?

11.09.12

Market War, the clash of Prey and

Designs for Mixtures

Franses. P.H.B.F.

c. Louman

Preditor

Goos, P.

Crash risk effect on stock returns

Tham, W.W.

Wel, M. van der

examined further

24-10-2012 18.10.2012

A.J. de jong

31.08.12

t.j. van Leeuwen

Price elasticity of giving in the

R. Teschmacher

Using retail savings for a profitable

Netherlands

17.09.12

Market Efficiency During Quarterly

mortgage funding strategy

Webbink, D.

G. Stapensea

Earnings Releases

Tham, W.W.

Econometric models to forecast

Wel, M. van der

Kole, H.J.W.G.

volatility in crude oil markets

24-10-2012 17.10.2012

t. Lamballais Tessensohn

29.08.12

S.E. Koster

An Ant Colony Algorithm for solving

W.K.G. Daalman

Modelling Individual and Collective

the Time Window Assignment Vehicle

11.09.12

On unspanned factors and estima-

choice behaviour in social networks

Routing Problem with Uncertain

S.J. Kippers

tion of Wishart term structure

Donkers, B.

Demand

The effect of Protestantism and

models

Fok, D.

Gabor, A.F.

Catholicism on economic, health and

Bouwman, K.E.

Karstanje, D.

philanthropic behaviour.

18-10-2012

3-10-2012

05.09.12

W.B. Ballering

m. van Etten

J. Nagelsmit

Efficient Daily Volatility Forecast

Comparing Term Structure Yield

11.09.12

the Public-to-Private Transaction in

and Forecast Revisions Using Intra-

Curve Models for Monte Carlo

M.S.N. van roon

the United Kingdom, 1997-2011

day Data

Value-at-Risk

The Companies’ Life-Cycle and the

Kole, H.J.W.G.

Dijk, D.J.C. van

Tham, W.W.

Webbink, D.

Cross-Section of Stock Returns A Stock and Portfolio-based Analysis

VOLUME 15 ISSUE 1 // ESTIMATOR ECONOMETRISCH DISPUUT

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