3) Poker. 26 red, 26 black. Take one every time, you can choose to guess whether it’s red. You have only one chance. If you are right, you get 1 dollar. What’s the strategy? And what’s the expected earn?
Quantitative Researcher Interview Questions
2,685 quantitative researcher interview questions shared by candidates
Given log X ~ N(0,1). Compute the expectation of X.
What are the last 4 digits of 2015^(2013^2014]? The three distinct entries of a 2 x 2 symmetric matrix are drawn from the uniform distribution [-60, 60]. What is the expected determinant of the matrix? How many times a day do the hour and minute hands of an analog clock form a right angle? If WHITE=000, RED-101, BLUE-110, and PURPLE-100, then what three-digit string corresponds to YELLOW? There are 4 green and 50 red apples in a basket. They are removed one-by-one, without replacement, until all 4 green ones are extracted. What is the expected number of apples that will be left in the basket? Given two assets that have expected excess returns of 7 and 4, and given their expected covariance matrix: {1,1}{1,2} What is the maximum expected Sharpe ratio that you can achieve by combining the two assets into a portfolio? Consider a polynomial f(x) and its derivative f (x) that are related according to: f(X) - f‘(X) = X"3 + 3*X"2 + 3*X + 1 What is f(9)? A pedestrian starts walking from town A to town B. At the same time, another pedestrian starts walking from town B to town A. They pass each other at noon and continue on their paths. One of them arrives at 4 PM, the other at 9 PM. How many hours had each walked before passing each other? Seven people are in an argument, but potentially some or all of them are liars. They give the following statements: Bob: "No one lies." Jennifer: "No one tells the truth." Conrad.: "Jennifer is not a liar." Tom: "Conrad and Sherry always lie at the same time." Sherry: "Danny never lies." Danny: "Sherry is a liar." Adam: "Danny sometimes lies.” How many of them are lying? A city is composed of three parallel east-west streets and four parallel north-south streets: Note there are 12 intersections and 17 street segments. A policeman needs to visit every street segment, but he wants to take the shortest path. The policeman can start at any intersection, and he can only traverse streets, going from one intersection to another. How many street segments are there in the shortest path that visits each street segment at least once? Three riflemen A, B, and C take turns shooting at a target. The first rifleman to hit the target gets 2002 dollars. A shoots first, B second, and C third, after which the cycle repeats again with A, until one of the riflemen hits the target. Each hits the target with probability 0.5. What is rifleman A's expected winnings in dollars? Nine boys and seven girls are seated randomly around a circular table with 16 seats. Find the expected number of girl-boy neighbors. For example, in the seating below there are four such pairs. GBBBBB G B G B GGGBBG
Game: I throw 1 die 4 times, trying to reach at least one 6, you throw 2 dice 24 times and try to reach at least one double 6 (6,6). Who has greater chance of winning
There is a solar system with three planets orbiting around the sun. One of them has a translation period of 60 years, another one of 84 years and another one of 140 years. Today, the three planets are aligned with the sun. When is the next time the three planets will be aligned with the sun?
If X, Y and Z are three random variables such that X and Y have a correlation of 0.9, and Y and Z have correlation of 0.8, what are the minimum and maximum correlation that X and Z can have?
A clock on the wall falls and breaks into 3 pieces with the same sum of numbers. What are the three pieces?
You have two decks of cards: a 52 card deck (26 black, 26 red) and a 26 card deck (13 black, 13 red). You randomly draw two cards and win if both are the same color. Which deck would you prefer? What if the 26 card deck was randomly drawn from the 52 card deck? Which deck would you prefer then?
Interesting question: From a deck of 52 cards pick 26 at random. From this set of 26 you pick two cards. You win if the both of these cards are of the same color. Is this a game you would prefer over one in which you win by picking two (first two picks) of the same color at random from a deck of 26 with equal number of black and red cards
A tosses n+1 coins. B tosses n coins. B wins if he has at least as many heads as A. What is the probability that B wins?
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