third edition, march 2010

N e v e r a d u l l m o m e n tI n t e r v i e w A r n o u d K l e p

C h i p c a r d f o r p u b l i c t r a n s p o r tS p e c i a l

S i m u l a t i o n i n t h e D u t c h f l o w e r t r a d eP r a c t i c a l R e p o r t

ekst

A s s e t | E c o n o m e t r i c s M a g a z i n e V o l u m e 1 8 , t h i r d e d i t i o n , M a r c h 2 0 1 0

o f A l l

P R e f A c e

ColoPHoN

Nekst is the quarterly magazine of Asset | econometrics ©2010

Correspondence

Asset | econometrics Tilburg UniversityRoom e 110P.O.Box 901535000 Le TilburgTelephone: 013 466 27 [email protected] www.Asset-econometrics.nl

Editorial staff

Marleen Balvert

Tess Beukers

frans fonville

Harold van Heijst

Dimphy Hermans

Bart Kruize

Bas Verheul

Has van Vlokhoven

Nienke Vugts

fang Qi Wu

Contributions

Tessa Bakkers

Joost van Beek

Yvonne Blom

Harmen Boersma

Jorrit ten Brinke

Jeroen Dalderop

emile van elen

Toine Geelen

Gerwald van Gulick

Joep Hendriks

Dennis Jaheruddin

Marleen van Kalmthout

ernst Keyzer

Andrea Krajina

elske Leenaars

Vincent Lous

Maarten Meeuwis

Anne Michielsen

Robbert van Oosten

Loes van der Padt

chris Pustjens

Martin Salm

Dirk Ungerechts

Printing

Drukkerij Orangebook

Circulation

650

Nekst 3 - March 2010 1

first of all, I would like to introduce two new editors of Nekst: Dimphy

Hermans and Has van Vlokhoven. At the same time, Whitney Pattinaja

left the editorial staff, even though we will never forget her noteworthy

contributions to this magazine. furthermore, let me describe the events of

the past few months in just one verb: fall.

In December, many snowflakes fell down from the sky and created a beautiful landscape. In contrast to the opinion of the majority, I want to emphasize that snow is fun and not annoying. I heard a lot of people complain about the weather, mostly because they were afraid of falling as a result of slippery roads.

In february, a lot of people enjoyed themselves by celebrating carnaval. Some members of Asset | econometrics had a wonderful time by participating in the carnaval volleyball tournament at the sports centre of Tilburg University. However, the booze made some of them a little too enthusiastic, so it turned out to be very important to prevent yourself from falling on the ground during a game of volleyball. Unfortunately, I did not succeed in this objective.

Luckily, there is also some positive news related to the verb ‘fall’. I am of course referring to this magazine, which fell on your doormat. I hope this third edition will again offer you a lot of joy and knowledge. Hopefully, you are going to read a lot of scientific articles, interviews and columns this time, since it is very important to expand your knowledge every day. furthermore, I am confident that you will enjoy the interview with Arnoud Klep. This name will probably not sound very familiar, but if I tell you that he was a board member of our association exactly ten years ago, then you are most likely very eager to gain knowledge of his wisdom.

Before you fall over yourself to read all articles right away, I will no longer obstruct you from reading and wish you all the best forthis spring season!

frans fonville

Editor-in-chief

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Preface

from the Board

Interview Arnoud Klep

excursion SNS ReAAL

The Mother of Bart van Schuppen

Scientific Article Kempen & co

freshmen Activity and Saint Nicholas Drink

The Teacher: Gert Nieuwenhuis

excursion Nuon

Parents evening

Asset christmas Gala

Business Interview TNO

column Gerwald van Gulick

Practical Report

Active Members Meeting

General Members Meeting and Drink

Special: chip card for Public Transport

Opinion Poll

Actuary Day of Tilburg

Business Interview Pharmerit

An Introduction

Logistics Symposium and Après Ski Drink

exchange Report

Scientific Article KPMG

VAeT Activity

The Passion of Lindsay Overkamp

column Martin Salm

carnaval Volleyball Tournament and Asset Party

Triangle

Living in Lodges

LeD: National econometricians Day

committee Profile: Drinks & Activities

Quatsch

Graduates and Planning

Puzzle

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t H E S P r I N g S E M E S t E r

f R O M T H e B O A R D

for the next few weeks, the l ink ‘check Study Results’ on the Digital Learning environment was the most visited l ink amongst students. Blackboard kept them in suspense, but l ittle by l ittle the results were announced. One could strike a balance and pass to the order of the day. The spring semester began; the esplanade building became crowded again.

While for most students exams are the order of the day in January, the boards of study associations are preparing their General Members Meetings. So did we, as our General Members Meeting took place on 27 January. During this meeting we looked back on the first semester and we presented our plans for the upcoming months. We sti l l have lots of nice activities lying ahead of us, but let me first look back on some activities that already took place in the second semester.

Asset | econometrics & Asset | TOP-DOWN bundled their forces in order to organise the Logistics symposium. On 2 March, students were explained how a cost reduction could be realised via a cross chain control centre, which is a control centre in which multiple supply chains are coordinated and managed. The day passed away smoothly and may be considered a success. Also the cooperation with Asset | TOP-DOWN went well .

Then, after waiting for it for a long time, it was finally 8 March. On this day the Landelijke econometristendag (National econometricians Day) took place. With near eighty econometricians from Tilburg we travelled to Amsterdam RAI. The programme of the day was somewhat different from previous years, since there were two rounds of cases instead of one

case round and two presentation rounds. The organising committee, consisting of students of study associations VSAe (University of Amsterdam) and Kraket ( VU University Amsterdam), made sure that everything was organised well . In achieving this goal, they were assisted by many volunteers. After a successful day, the party in the cooldown café was the icing on the cake.

The next day, we were looking out for some serious sleeping time. But we had l ittle time to rest on our laurels, because on Thursday 11 March it was time for the Asset Beer cantus.

In the upcoming months, there are some wonder ful activities ahead. for example, the Active Members Weekend (9-11 April) , the economic Business weeks Tilburg (12-22 April) , the football Symposium (28 April) and the football Tournament (9 June). I f only the next few months could please not fly by as fast as the past months.

On behalf of the Asset | econometrics board,

Harold van HeijstChairman Asset | Econometrics

Name: Harold van Heijst

Position:Chairman

Asset | Econometrics

Board 2009-2010

During a cold January, it was quiet in the Esplanade building. It was hard to find any (active) members on the

first floor. the boards of the Asset associations were depending on themselves. but at least, there were some

free workplaces. As the month passed, more and more active members showed up. Most of them were having

lively conversations about their exams.

Nekst 3 - March 2010 �

� Nekst 3 - March 2010

Nekst introduces to you: Arnoud Klep. Arnoud was born in 1977 in breda. After graduating from secondary school, he

had to choose where he wanted to study Econometrics. He did not have to think long about it. So tilburg University

became his home for the subsequent years. He managed to finish his bachelor’s programme in three years and

obtained his master’s degree three years later. those six years of his life form the main reason for this interview.

becoming ac tiveArnoud star ted his studies in Ti lburg in 1995. He became an active member of our study association in 1997, which was cal led ‘ T i lburgse econometristen Vereniging’ ( TeV ) at that t ime. The f irst committee he was par t of, was the Drinks & Activit ies committee (Dutch: Spor t Borrel & feest commissie) .

The board of that year was look ing for enthusiastic people who wanted to organise a conference and they asked Arnoud for the new committee as well .

Arnoud became chairman of the committee that star ted organising a conference about f inancial r isk management in 1997. for most members of the committee, this assignment was their f i rst active involvement in the association. This rather unusual decision was not without a reason. The Wim Bogers Stichting ( WBS, currently k nown as SAeT: foundation Asset | econometrics Ti lburg) , the independent foundation that was responsible for the conference at that t ime, and our association showed l itt le cooperation in those days. While sharing the same room, our association and WBS would sometimes even refuse to use each other ’s staplers. Arnoud tr ied to overcome theses histor ical sensit ivit ies by having the two cultures merged. With a group of people who, just l ike himself, k new l itt le about organising a conference, they organised a great day about f inancial r isk management. The committee worked ver y hard for one and a half year for that one day. When that day f inal ly arr ived, they were glad to see that ever ything went well and that al l v is itors had a nice day. Arnoud: “ I t was a great experience and I learned a lot about organising and cooperation.”

the boardBecause of his tasks with respect to organising the conference, Arnoud spent a lot of t ime at the rooms of the association. One day, they asked him whether or not he would be interested in becoming a board member. Since he enjoyed being active, he was truly interested. He put himself for ward as candidate and was chosen chairman of the board for the academic year 1999-2000.

Of course, he was not the only board member. Marieke van Boekel was secretar y, Remco Ri jntjes was treasurer and Lennar t chattel was coordinator external affairs. Arnoud already k new Lennar t from the conference committee and they were both determined to make the best out of i t . The four of them made a plan for the upcoming board year.

Although they did not k now each other at the star t of their board year and though they did not agree on al l matters, they became a ver y staunch group. They st i l l talk to each other ever y now and then, despite of their completely different l ives and geographic locations. for several years, they arranged former board weekend tr ips together and an annually recurr ing christmas dinner.

The board changed several things in the academic year 1999-2000. They put a lot of effor t in arranging a study tr ip for which you could earn study credits. Nowadays, this would not be possible anymore. Unti l 1999, Nekst was pr inted in the size of A5 paper, but this was changed into A4 paper s ize, as we k now it now. The internet medium became more popular as well and therefore the board built a professional website for the association.

E V E r A D U l l M o M E N t

Name: Arnoud Klep

Age:33

I N T e R V I e W A R N O U D K L e P


Above al l , they had to take care of al l the affairs that ever y board has to deal with.

Arnoud and his fellow board members star ted some nice tradit ions, some of which st i l l prevai l in our days. for instance the famous phenomenon of ‘ turning’ (Dutch: keren) during the Active Members Weekend: the chairman should be turned while s leeping in his bed and at the end

of the weekend the chairman has to clean the toi lets. They tr ied to maintain the tradit ion of tak ing home the cups of tournaments they par t icipated in, even i f they did not win a pr ize at al l .

Of course, being a board member is not always mere fun. There have to be done some ser ious tasks as well . fur thermore, the board got an extra, ver y impor tant task. The study association that was responsible for organising the LeD (National econometricians Day) backed out in a late stadium. The fact that the LeD would not take place was unacceptable for Arnoud and his fel low board members, so they decided to organise the LeD themselves. This was not an easy task, because they only had nine weeks unti l the event would take place. They worked hard and eventual ly they were able to organise a day to be extremely proud of.

This was one of the reasons for the board of 1999-2000 to improve the cooperation between the study

associations for econometrics in the Netherlands. Arnoud always enjoyed contact with other associations. He k nows a lot has changed since he left the board, although he does not think that an overal l cooperation, l ike Asset, would have been possible at the t ime of his chairmanship. According to Arnoud, this remark was formulated exceptional ly tactful . He thinks that it should have been hard for some

former active members to hear that the decision was made for a formal al l iance with the other economics study associations within Asset. He admits that he is aware of the advantages of work ing together and that t imes have changed. Therefore, he respects the cal l of the board that made the decision.

InvolvedIn the period after his board year, there were a lot of changes. He got his f i rst job and was no longer a student. After his board year, Arnoud enrol led in an internship at Robeco. When f inished and graduated, a spot came avai lable at the quantitative research depar tment of Robeco. He worked there for two and a half years and after that switched to the structured f inance depar tment.

At the same t ime, Arnoud was par t of the advisor y counci l of Asset | econometrics. He was a member of this board for about s ix years. He l iked it a lot, s ince he st i l l felt a t ight connection with Ti lburg University. Arnoud: “ I t was a ver y

interesting period. You are no longer involved in the day to day business, although you st i l l keep in touch with econometrics students.” He sometimes regretted some decisions that were made and he might have done some things differently, but he real ised that things change. In his view, the board of the association should always be best equipped for mak ing the overal l decisions.

Arnoud st i l l attends some activit ies of Asset | econometrics. During last year ’s lustrum for instance, he had a great t ime. He thinks it is good to see that the members of the association st i l l have as much energy and commitment and st i l l arrange a lot of activit ies. He also attended al l KOALAs (activit ies arranged for former active members) up t i l l now. Init ial ly, former active member activit ies were comprised of bowling nights and dinners. In 2004, however, Arnoud and former active member Ramon wondered whether these activit ies could be more extensive. They convinced the board to expand the activit ies and turn the event into a complete weekend (cal led KOALA) with considerable attention for tradit ional elements.

Overal l , Arnoud looks back at some great years. He learned a lot and even more impor tant: he had a wonder ful t ime and made some good fr iends. |

Tex t by : Nienke Vugts

“I t was a g reat exper ience and I l earned a lo t . . . ”

Position:Former Board

Member


I N V E S t I g A t I N g b A N K I N g

P r o D U C t Se x c U R S I O N S N S R e A A L

for me, the day star ted with a meeting of the Logist ics Symposium committee. I f igured that I would have plenty of t ime between the meeting and the excursion to SNS ReAAL, so I did not understand why ever yone who par ticipated in this excursion had already left . That was, unti l I found out that we had to gather at T i lburg central Station at 11:30 hours instead of 12:00 hours. Oh dear! I a lready pictured myself running towards the train on my high heels. for tunately, this is not what real ly happened. After a couple of missed cal ls from one of the board members, I was on the train with the rest of the group, heading towards SNS ReAAL.

Upon arr ival at Utrecht central Station, we were only a f ive-minute walk away from our destination, as the off ice of SNS ReAAL is in the middle of the city centre of Utrecht. The wind was howling, so we were glad we could go inside quick ly.

After having waited for a while in the foyer of the building, a man cal led Maurice Bosch welcomed us. He led us to a lecture room where two of his col leagues introduced

themselves. As they were tr ying to make the beamer work, we sat down and had a cup of tea or coffee. Soon after, we l istened to a presentation about SNS ReAAL.

SNS ReAAL is a Dutch bank ing and insurance ser vice provider. During this excursion, we would focus on bank ing products. We were going and tr ying to understand how a par t icular bank ing product works. Bank ing products are becoming more and more complex, so an introduction was definitely necessar y.

We were told about swaps, continuous interest rates as opposed to discrete interest rates, put and cal l options, and more. After this explanation about the basics of bank ing products, i t was t ime to get star ted. In groups of about four people, we were asked to f ind out what happens to cer tain bank ing products. After f i f teen minutes, each group had to present their solutions. Although the f irst solution of my group was not that good, we did establ ish an improvement. By the t ime we got to the third product, I bel ieve that we even got the correct answer! Unfor tunately, another group was chosen as the winner of the day and the members of this group took off with some nice gadgets. After a dr ink and a chat with the employees of SNS ReAAL, we returned to Ti lburg.

We went to Utrecht to learn more about the use of quantitative f inance in practice. In my opinion, we learned a lot about this. Nowadays, bank ing products are in the news quite often. To learn what real ly happens to such a product is, in my opinion, a great chal lenge and a good example of econometrics in practice. |

Name: Elske Leenaars

Age:22

begin studies:2007

on 2 December, a group of students following the course Quantitative finance went to Utrecht. In this city,

Asset | Econometrics – in cooperation with SNS rEAAl – organised an excursion to the office of SNS rEAAl.

During this excursion, students visit a company in the field of a certain course and learn more about the use

of econometrics in practice.

S N S R E A A L

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10 Nekst 3 - March 2010

When we, two brave editors of Nekst, arrived at the railway station in best, a car was waiting for us. the

driver of the car was bart’s mother. this was very convenient, because we were going to interview her for

this edition of Nekst. She drove us to her house, where we held the interview.

cecile, Bart ’s mother, was born in Zevenbergen in 1959, which is close to Breda. She was the middle child of two brothers and two sisters. Her primary school was located in Zevenbergen, so she could easily go there. Besides, there was also a swimming pool in Zevenbergen, which cecile used a lot during the summer breaks. When she went to secondary school she had to go by train, since her school was located in Oudenbosch. This train was usually full of students, so this was a fun place with a lot of noise. When she finished her secondary school, she went to eindhoven to study youth professionalism (Dutch: jeugdwelzijnswerk). furthermore, she started l iving in lodges in eindhoven. There were more girls than boys at this school and for this reason she more l iked secondary school. Maybe econometrics would have been a better choice? She really l iked the content of her studies, as it was very broad.

cecile met her husband Marc in eindhoven, who also studied there. They met in the ‘bunker ’ at a party on a Thursday evening. This is not a study place l ike the bunker in Tilburg, but it is a general meeting place. Several bands per formed, a beer cost sixty cents ( in guilders), and it was opened ti l l four o’clock in the morning. All of this created a very good atmosphere and the bunker was therefore a fun place to be.

On 19 November 1989, Bart was born. As a baby, he was not very easy to handle: he was a bit tear ful. cecile thinks that this was because Bart did not want to be a baby and that he wanted to do more than he was capable of. fortunately, this changed when he started walking and talk ing. cecile thinks that this period is one of the best parts of his childhood. One of the things

he really l iked doing during his childhood was changing clothes while playing. Videos were made about this. Unfortunately, those videos are on videotape and we could not watch them as they only had a DVD player. When Bart went to primary school, he was a serious pupil and not difficult to handle. Bart has a younger sister, evi, and they used to play a lot together. They even had their own brand name: Bavi. This name was used frequently during playing together.

At the moment, cecile has two jobs. She has a job at a pre-school playgroup, where she started working about fourteen years ago as a volunteer and where she has been a professional since five years now. She could easily combine this with caring for her children as she only had to work during school times and her vacations were at the same time as the vacations of her children’s primary school. Her other job is at a child care. She just started a course that she can use for her work. She hopes that she can keep doing this work for a long period of time. Besides these jobs, cecile also followed a course in Spanish and now she can speak Spanish fluently. cecile started following this course after a holiday in Spain, during which Bart told her that she could not say anything other than ‘ah’ combined with some hand gestures. Out of shame, she started a course in Spanish immediately after that holiday, hoping that the above would never have to happen again. Her language skil ls significantly improved and from then on they go to Spain almost every year. She stopped following the course, but for three years now she meets with someone following a course in Spanish once a week and they talk Spanish the whole time. cecile is also going to begin a new hobby : she is going to do a course in running. She is promised

P A N I S H I N b E S t

Name: Cecile Wijne

residence:Best

Mother of: Bart van Schuppen

T H e M O T H e R O f B A R T V A N S c H U P P e N


that at the end of the course, she will be able to run five k ilometres in half an hour.

In primary school, Bart wanted to get involved with sports, but he did not want to do something with running or a ball . Nevertheless, he decided to play hockey, which is a sport in which you have to run a lot and a ball is involved. He l iked it so much that he is sti l l doing it . He also considered playing kor fball , but due to the fact that the baskets

are on top of poles, it turned out to be too difficult for Bart and he decided to do something else. Bart also plays keyboard and guitar. He even considered attending the music academy instead of studying econometrics. Nevertheless, it seemed better to him to keep making music his hobby.

Soon it was clear that Bart is pretty smart, but cecile did not notice a big preference for mathematics in Bart at f irst, since he was equally

good at all courses. In the last years of secondary school, however, she noticed a sl ight preference for mathematics.

Nekst wonders whether Bart looks more l ike his mother or his father. cecile immediately answers that her son looks more l ike her. I t often happens that she is thinking about something and that Bart starts talk ing about it simply out of nothing. Besides, they both have the same type of humour. However, Bart does not completely agree with his mother ’s opinion. Bart and his father share an interest for cars and the economy. furthermore, both l ike being active within an association.

Nekst also wants to know what has gone well and not so well in Bart ’s upbringing. cecile thinks she has done a great job and she does not worry about Bart and his future. There is only one thing she could have done better. She says that she has done too much for him as she did not give him any tasks around the house. This was because she never had to help her parents during her childhood either. This resulted in the fact that Bart is not very good at cleaning up his stuff.

Bart l ives in lodges for a few weeks now. This is not an enormous shock for cecile, since Bart was not at home very often the past year. cecile thinks that this is a per fect chance for Bart as she really enjoyed living in lodges herself.

cecile is very proud of Bart. As a f inal advice, she says: “enjoy your youth.” We decided to finish the interview with these wise words. Before we returned to Tilburg, we ate a delicious meal prepared by cecile. |

Text by : Has van Vlokhoven

B a r t p l a y i n g i n t h e s u n

begin studies: 2008


Kempen Capital Management (KCM) was the first company to introduce an article on the topic of fundamental

indexation for European real estate equities in April 2008. this was a revolutionary idea: instead of weighting

according to market capitalisation, KCM developed an index on the basis of fundamental factors as advocated

by United States academic robert Arnott, the father of fundamental indexation.

The underlying idea is that market capitalisation-weighted indices structurally allocate large weights to overvalued companies. This is avoided by weighting according to fundamental factors. Two years passed and the worldwide success of fundamental indexation is still growing. Total global assets in portfolios managed on the basis of fundamental indexation rose to US$18 billion as of mid-2009. This represents a growth of about 20% compared to the end of 2007. In the wake of our european study, KcM recently completed a study into fundamental indexation (called Smart Indexing) in the global real estate market.

A brief summary of previous articles: fundamental indexation for european real estate equities leads to better results than traditional, market capitalisation-weighted indices. The european study covered the period 1990-2007 and displayed an average extra return of 2% per year while involving a lower risk. In July 2008, these promising results were used as a basis for transforming Kempen Real estate Securities Index Sampling fund (KReSISf) into a Smart Indexing product (soon to be renamed Kempen european Property Smart Indexing fund). Since its relaunch, the fund has performed as shown in figure 1.

from the outset, KReSISf outperformed the market capitalisation-weighted index GPR 250 europe by 1.3% per year. Moreover, the

fund was less affected by plummeting market prices in the second half of 2008. KReSISf’s lower 2009 performance compared to GPR 250 europe can be attributed to its higher weighting of British companies, which did not perform well, and its underweight in Austria, which displayed a strong return in 2009.

Do the European results also apply globally? The methodology is identical to the one of the european study. first, fundamental factors were selected, which are representative for the real estate market. These factors also had to meet the following criteria: 1) they are representative of a company’s economic size, 2) they bear no relation to the valuation and/or price of equities, and 3) information on the factor must be freely available and consistently calculated. Three fundamental factors have been studied on the basis of these criteria, namely eBITDA (earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation), rental income and gross dividends. Various factors were considered, including book value, but these did not meet the criteria. Book value contains a price link as real estate is valued at market value.

The historical performances of two indices were mimicked for the period 1988-2009. In order to maintain the liquidity of these indices at as high a level as possible, 250 companies were initially selected on the basis of free float market capitalisation. Next, a fundamentally-weighted composite index was constructed using the three selected factors and comprising 250 companies, the Smart Index Global. As mentioned above, the weight depends on eBITDA, total rental income and gross dividends. each factor was given an equal weight. Secondly, a market capitalisation-weighted index was constructed using the same investment universe. This index

M A r t I N D E x I N g f o r r E A l

E S t A t E E Q U I t I E S

an example, the standard deviation of all negative returns was 13.86% for Smart Index Global and 13.94% for the market capitalisation-weighted index. Credit crunch Our study demonstrates that Smart Index Global provides extra return with a comparable volatility compared to the market capitalisation-weighted index. Yet does it also earn extra return in a declining market when investors need it most? In theory, Smart Index Global should offer extra protection precisely in difficult times as it is often the value of overvalued equities that drops the furthest in falling markets. Precisely these equities have a structural overweight in market capitalisation-weighted indices, while this is not necessarily the case in Smart Index Global. As equity weight is not related to price in Smart Index Global, this index overweights both overvalued and undervalued equities on the basis of fundamental factors. There is no price link and for this reason Smart Index Global provides greater protection and higher returns in difficult times. The credit crunch gives us an opportunity to test this hypothesis. Both Smart Index Global and the market capitalisation-weighted index peaked in mid-2007. Over the period mid-2008 to April 2009, Smart Index Global earned an average annual outperformance of 3.5%. In the period September 2008 to February 2009, Smart Index Global slightly lagged behind the market capitalisation-weighted index. The reason for this laid in its greater weighting in value equities. Although value equities performed better in previous bear markets, these were hit the hardest in this market. Subsequently, there was a market correction in March 2009 and, on balance, Smart Index Global did in fact profit from this strategy.

Figure 4: Performance Smart Index Global during the credit crunch (mid ’07 – mid ’09) A fundamentally-weighted index can indeed provide positive results for a global real estate market compared to traditional, market capitalisation-weighted indices. Our study demonstrates an average outperformance of 2.4% per year with comparable volatility. Even during the recent credit crunch, Smart Index Global outperformed the market capitalisation-weighted index by 3.5% per year. Thanks to these results, KCM will soon launch a global product, which applies this methodology.

Name: Loes van der Padt

Position:Junior portfolio manager

S c I e N T I f I c A R T I c L e K e M P e N & c O


was used as a reference portfolio, as the only difference is the weight of the individual companies in the index. This resulted in a transparent comparison of the two methods operating in the same investment universe. The return was also compared to the return of an external market capitalisation-weighted index: GPR 250 Global.

Higher annualised returnThe study results for the global product are just as promising as for the european product. even during the recent credit crunch, Smart Index Global succeeded in generating outperformance compared to the benchmarks. Across the entire study period, Smart Index Global earned an annualised return of 7.9%, compared to 5.3% for the market capitalisation-weighted benchmark. This translates into an outperformance of 2.4% per year. furthermore, this result was achieved with a comparable volatility. Smart Index Global outperforms its external benchmark, GPR 250 Index, by 4.0% per year.

The regions included in the study, i.e. europe, Asia (including Australia) and North America, all contributed positively to the outperformance.

It is interesting to look at the index’s three-year rolling average outperformance. This gives an idea of Smart Index Global’s long-term outperformance. We can see that there

were only two clear, short-lived periods of underperformance during the study period.

Additional tests on downside risk, such as semi-standard deviation, maximum drawdown and conditional value-at-risk, also indicated that Smart Index Global provided slightly better protection. As an example, the standard deviation of all negative returns was 13.86% for Smart Index Global and 13.94% for the market capitalisation-weighted index.

Credit crunchOur study demonstrates that Smart Index Global provides extra return with a comparable volatility compared to the market capitalisation-weighted index. Yet does it also earn extra return in a declining market when investors need it most? In theory, Smart Index Global should offer extra protection precisely in difficult times as it is often the value of overvalued equities that drops the furthest in falling markets. Precisely these equities have a structural overweight in market capitalisation-weighted indices, while this is not necessarily the case in Smart Index Global. As equity weight is not related to price in Smart Index Global, this index overweights both overvalued and undervalued equities on the basis of fundamental factors. There is no price link and for this reason Smart Index Global provides greater protection and higher returns in difficult times. The credit crunch gives us an opportunity to test this hypothesis.

Both Smart Index Global and the market capitalisation-weighted index peaked in mid-2007. Over the period mid-2008 to April 2009, Smart Index Global earned an average annual outperformance of 3.5%. In the period September 2008 to february 2009, Smart Index Global slightly lagged behind the market capitalisation-weighted index. The reason for this laid in its greater weighting in value equities. Although value equities performed better in previous bear markets, these were hit the hardest in this market. Subsequently, there was a market correction in March 2009 and, on balance, Smart Index Global did in fact profit from this strategy.

A fundamentally-weighted index can indeed provide positive results for a global real estate market compared to traditional, market capitalisation-weighted indices. Our study demonstrates an average outperformance of 2.4% per year with comparable volatility. even during the recent credit crunch, Smart Index Global outperformed the market capitalisation-weighted index by 3.5% per year. Thanks to these results, KcM will soon launch a global product, which applies this methodology. |

Kempen & Co is an independent merchant bank

specialised in financial services for institutional

investors, companies and high-net-worth

individual clients. They provide specialist financial

services in asset management, corporate finance,

investment funds and securities brokerage.



Name: Joost van Beek

Position:Senior portfolio manager

Smart Indexing for real estate equities Kempen Capital Management (KCM) was the first company to introduce an article on the topic of fundamental indexation for European real estate equities in April 2008. This was a revolutionary idea: instead of weighting according to market capitalisation, KCM developed an index on the basis of fundamental factors as advocated by US academic Robert Arnott, the father of fundamental indexation. The underlying idea is that market capitalisation-weighted indices structurally allocate large weights to overvalued companies. This is avoided by weighting according to fundamental factors. Two years passed and the worldwide success of fundamental indexation is still growing. Total global assets in portfolios managed on the basis of fundamental indexation rose to US$18 billion as of mid-2009. This represents a growth of about 20% compared to the end of 2007. In the wake of our European study, KCM recently completed a study into fundamental indexation (called Smart Indexing) in the global real estate market. A brief summary of previous articles: fundamental indexation for European real estate equities leads to better results than traditional, market capitalisation-weighted indices. The European study covered the period 1990-2007 and displayed an average extra return of 2% per year while involving a lower risk. In July 2008, these promising results were used as a basis for transforming Kempen Real Estate Securities Index Sampling Fund (KRESISF) into a Smart Indexing product (soon to be renamed Kempen European Property Smart Indexing Fund). Since its relaunch, the fund has performed as shown in figure 1.

* Up to and including 31 August 2009 Figure 1: Smart Indexing Europe vs. market capitalisation-weighted index From the outset, KRESISF outperformed the market capitalisation-weighted index GPR 250 Europe by 1.3% per year. Moreover, the fund was less affected by plummeting market prices in the second half of 2008. KRESISF’s lower 2009 performance compared to GPR 250 Europe can be attributed to its higher weighting of British companies, which did not perform well, and its underweight in Austria, which displayed a strong return in 2009. Do the European results also apply globally? The methodology is identical to the one of the European study. First, fundamental factors were selected, which are representative for the real estate market. These factors also had to meet the following criteria: 1) they are representative of a company’s economic size, 2) they bear no relation to the valuation and/or price of equities, and 3) information on the factor must be freely available and consistently calculated. Three fundamental factors have been studied on the basis of these criteria, namely EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation), rental income and gross dividends. Various factors were considered, including book value, but these did not meet the criteria. Book value contains a price link as real estate is valued at market value. The historical performances of two indices were mimicked for the period 1988-2009. In order to maintain the liquidity of these indices at as high a level as possible, 250 companies were initially selected on the basis of free float market capitalisation. Next, a fundamentally-weighted composite index was constructed using the three selected factors and comprising 250 companies, the Smart Index Global. As mentioned above, the weight depends on EBITDA, total rental income and gross dividends. Each factor was given an equal weight. Secondly, a market capitalisation-weighted index was constructed using the same investment universe. This index was used as a reference portfolio, as the only difference is the weight of the individual companies in the index. This resulted in a transparent

comparison of the two methods operating in the same investment universe. The return was also compared to the return of an external market capitalisation-weighted index: GPR 250 Global. Higher annualised return for Smart Index Global The study results for the global product are just as promising as for the European product. Even during the recent credit crunch, Smart Index Global succeeded in generating outperformance compared to the benchmarks. Across the entire study period, Smart Index Global earned an annualised return of 7.9%, compared to 5.3% for the market capitalisation-weighted benchmark. This translates into an outperformance of 2.4% per year. Furthermore, this result was achieved with a comparable volatility. Smart Index Global outperforms its external benchmark, GPR 250 Index, by 4.0% per year.

Figure 2: Yearly risk/return ratio Smart Index Global vs. market capitalisation weighted index 1988-2009 The regions included in the study, i.e. Europe, Asia (including Australia) and North America, all contributed positively to the outperformance. It is interesting to look at the index’s three-year rolling average outperformance. This gives an idea of Smart Index Global’s long-term outperformance. We can see that there were only two clear, short-lived periods of underperformance during the study period.

Figure 3: Outperformance of Smart Index Global Additional tests on downside risk, such as semi-standard deviation, maximum drawdown and conditional value-at-risk, also indicated that Smart Index Global provided slightly better protection. As

Figure 2: Yearly risk/return ratio Smar t

Index Global vs. market capitalisation

weighted index 1988-2009

comparison of the two methods operating in the same investment universe. The return was also compared to the return of an external market capitalisation-weighted index: GPR 250 Global. Higher annualised return for Smart Index Global The study results for the global product are just as promising as for the European product. Even during the recent credit crunch, Smart Index Global succeeded in generating outperformance compared to the benchmarks. Across the entire study period, Smart Index Global earned an annualised return of 7.9%, compared to 5.3% for the market capitalisation-weighted benchmark. This translates into an outperformance of 2.4% per year. Furthermore, this result was achieved with a comparable volatility. Smart Index Global outperforms its external benchmark, GPR 250 Index, by 4.0% per year.

Figure 2: Yearly risk/return ratio Smart Index Global vs. market capitalisation weighted index 1988-2009 The regions included in the study, i.e. Europe, Asia (including Australia) and North America, all contributed positively to the outperformance. It is interesting to look at the index’s three-year rolling average outperformance. This gives an idea of Smart Index Global’s long-term outperformance. We can see that there were only two clear, short-lived periods of underperformance during the study period.

Figure 3: Outperformance of Smart Index Global Additional tests on downside risk, such as semi-standard deviation, maximum drawdown and conditional value-at-risk, also indicated that Smart Index Global provided slightly better protection. As

Figure 3: Outperformance of Smart Index

Global



Figure 4: Performance Smart Index Global

during the credit crunch (mid ’07 – mid ’09)

* Up to and including 31 August 2009

Figure 1: Smart Indexing Europe vs. market

capitalisation-weighted index

Nekst 3 - March 2010 1�

A W I l D b U l l A N D C o l o U r E D

S H o t Sf R e S H M e N A c T I V I T Y A N D S A I N T N I c H O L A S D R I N K

rodeoOn Tuesday evening, I biked to Voltage. I was already warned for getting a lot of bruises during this activity, but I bravely entered the building with my old sports shoes on. Voltage has a big hall where you can do a lot of activities and you can also play paintball in the biggest indoor paintball area of europe. Inside the building, I met the other freshmen and many sophomores. We were split into two groups and my group started with the rodeo. Because I lacked the skills for riding a wild bull, I decided to watch other people on the rodeo.

The goal was to sit three minutes on the wild bull having one hand on the bull and a hat in the other, as if you were a real cowboy. If you could handle this, then you were a winner. Unfortunately, it was not easy to accomplish this. The bull was untamed and I heard that you did not sit on a soft pillow, so three minutes were actually very long. However, it was fun to see how everyone tried to handle the bull.

PaintballAfter the rodeo, we went to the paintball area, which was a big, cold, and dark hall that resembles a battlefield with sounds of war. We could dress ourselves in red or white overalls as there was a red and a white team. I was part of the white team and our motto was ‘shining white’ (Dutch: stralend wit) and ‘white should stay white’ (Dutch: wit moet wit blijven). Armed with a gun and fifty paintballs, we set foot on the battlefield. With a helmet on our heads and constantly forced to take cover behind barrels, it was hard to see your enemy. After a short time, however, the war started. Hitting the enemy twice meant his death, so when you saw two hands in the air you knew you had done your job well. The dead people had to go to the instructor, who counted the number of deaths in each team. After that,

you could return and enjoy the game again. Unfortunately, the other team consisted of real slaughters, so we lost the game.

Saint NicholasAfter the activities, we went to café Babbus, where the monthly drink of Asset | econometrics took place. The pub was decorated in Saint Nicholas style and several members, who had placed their shoes in the Astrics room the week before, received a present from the Saint. Because Saint Nicholas had missed the boat back to Spain, he visited the econometricians in Tilburg with two Black Peters (Dutch: Zwarte Pieten) at the pub this evening. Some members had to come over to the Saint and they had to sit on his lap, because the Black Peters had noticed some interesting actions of these members in the past year. Of course, the Saint also brought presents with him. The winner of the rodeo activity received a present with a cowboy theme and after the board members of Asset | econometrics sang a song for the Saint, they all got a chocolate letter. furthermore, the only male board member received a football with little princesses. The Saint also offered a free barrel of beer and after that he definitely had to go back to Spain. It was a nice evening and I am looking forward to the next freshmen Activity! |

Name: Chris Pustjens

Age:18

begin studies:2009

If I think of paintball, then I think of American movies, in which people on a ranch throw balloons filled with

paint to each other. So when I had the opportunity to enjoy a game of paintball during the freshmen Activity,

I immediately subscribed myself at the Astrics room.

S a i n t N i c h o l a s a n d h i s B l a c k P e t e r s

Calculator of innovator?

In de sector zorg en welzijn is PGGM een financiële dienstverlener

van formaat. Kijk maar naar de cijfers: we beheren de pensioenen

van meer dan twee miljoen klanten en we beleggen negentig

miljard euro wereldwijd. En dan hebben we het nog niet eens

over de aanvullende producten die we ontwikkelen. Kortom,

typisch een organisatie waar ambitieuze vernieuwers zich

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in het actuariaat. Heb je er de inhoud voor, dan wacht je een

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dingen en een prettige balans tussen werk en privé. Klinkt goed?

Klopt. Lees meer over je kansen op www.pggm.nl/werkenbij

StagiairJunior actuarieel medewerker

De toonaangevende afdeling Actuariaat & Asset Liability

Management van PGGM bestaat uit 25 professionals. Jonge

mensen, die advies uitbrengen over de meest uiteenlopende

kwesties. Wat wordt bijvoorbeeld ons financiële beleid? Hoe

‘houdbaar’ is een pensioencontract? Wat is de beste methode

van verslaglegging en welk verzekeringsproduct heeft echt

toegevoegde waarde? Maar ook: wat moet de invloed van het

solidariteitsprincipe zijn? Al met al heb je tal van mogelijkheden.

Je kunt beginnen met een (afstudeer)stage. Of je kiest gelijk

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Bel (030) 277 85 43 voor meer informatie. Direct sollicite-

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PGGM, Human Resources, t.a.v. Martine Gersen, Postbus

117, 3700 AC Zeist, of per mail naar [email protected].

www.pggm.nl/werkenbij

Joha

n va

n Ar

kel,

PGGM

1� Nekst 3 - March 2010

You probably know gert Nieuwenhuis as a teacher of econometrics courses and statistical courses for

economists. What you probably do not know, is that he was born as a farmer’s son. this is the story of a

farmer’s son, who became an Associate Professor in Statistics at tilburg University.

YouthGert was born in empe, which is a village close to Zutphen, on a small farm. In primary school, he was very good at studying and therefore the head of the school gave him the advice to go to the lyceum. Although he was expected to become a farmer, he knew that a future as a farmer on a small farm was not too bright and he decided to follow this advice and he went to study in Zutphen. first, he did the ULO, which is comparable to the theoretical layer of VMBO these days. After one year on the ULO, he went to grammar school. This was very complicated in the beginning, since he was born as a farmer’s son and could therefore not speak Dutch: only dialect. After finishing grammar school, he could not get a scholarship and his parents did not have enough money to pay for his studies. Therefore, he decided to work for a while and started working at the IT department of Akzo, although he always kept in mind that he wanted to study sooner or later.

Gert studied Mathematics in Nijmegen. Nevertheless, it was not his first choice. The main reason for attending Greek and Latin at secondary school was that he wanted to become an archaeologist. At that time, archaeology was clustered with the Roman ages, in which he was – and still is – very interested. Unfortunately, there was not a lot of work for archaeologists back then and therefore it seemed wise to study his second choice.

His days as a student (1968 – 1970) were a restless time. It was a time with lots of occupations of buildings. In his second year of Mathematics, students from Radboud University Nijmegen (including Gert) occupied the Mathematics faculty. They proposed a different way of education: more teamwork, more society centred and less formal. This occupation lasted for about four to five months.

The actions came to a standstill because of the summer break, during which everybody went on holiday. Although the occupation issue blew over, it was an interesting experience from which everyone learned a lot.

During his studies, Gert had a considerable amount of jobs in order to be able to keep up with the costs of studying. Amongst others he worked at Van Gend & Loos, Honig, Gazelle and as a student assistant at the university. furthermore, he worked as a teacher in mathematics at a secondary school in the last two years of his studies. This was a job for about twenty-five hours a week. Since an almost full working week was difficult to combine with his studies, he decided to stop teaching, and soon after he finished his studies.

University careerAfter graduation, Gert was asked to set up the course Stochastic Point Processes at the Mathematics department of Radboud University Nijmegen. This course was also meant for students in medical physics. The next two years, he set up this course and gave lectures as well. After these two years, he did research in the field of Stochastic Processes and Statistics. He obtained a doctoral degree and worked for two and a half days and later three and a half days a week at the university. This schedule was perfect for Gert, since he had two young children at that time and his wife had a job as well. Later on, he could not get a full assignment in Nijmegen anymore, so he went to Tilburg University to work with Professor Van der Genugten.

Nekst asked Gert Nieuwenhuis whether or not he has the ambition to become a full professor. He answered that if one wants to become a full professor, that person has to do a lot of research and has to have a considerable number of publications. In Gert’s view, however, research

E A C H I N g S H o U l D b E t A K E N

M o r E S E r I o U S lY

Name: Gert Nieuwenhuis

Position:Associate Professor

T H e T e A c H e R


comes in second place. Instead of doing research, he prefers giving lectures and developing course material. Together with Professor Van der Genugten, he developed Dutch lecture notes for Introduction to Probability Theory and Probability and Statistics.

Recently, he also developed some other course material. for three years, he had been writing a book for the course Statistics 1 for Business economics, which he did mostly in the weekends. He finished his book Statistical Methods for Business and economics in 2009. What Gert really likes about developing subject material is that all the topics of the course have to be covered and tied together, whilst you also have to consider how far you will go into doing this. His assumption is that if you raise the standard, students will aim higher as well.

According to Gert, it is an unpleasant development that research is considered more important than education at Tilburg University. In his opinion, education has to be taken more seriously. He has been chairman of the educational committee for bachelor’s programmes in Business since 2004 and is therefore faced with this discussion quite often. Of course, the university will never say that you give too many lectures and that you should put more effort in research instead, but gradually the department members become supposed to earn their own money. If your principal activity is teaching, then this is impossible to do. currently, if you teach a course, you get money from a separate fund. Basically, all courses get the same amount of money and Gert thinks that this is unfair. for the econometrics programme, this is not a problem, but for the economics studies, there are large differences in the amount of work between the different courses. for some courses, only the professor has to be paid, but some other courses are a lot more labour intensive, as many lectures, tutorials and practical lessons are required. According to Gert, the lecturers of those courses

should therefore receive more money. In his opinion, the university should deal with education in the following way. first of all, there should be more money and appreciation for teaching. Secondly, the money should be divided on the basis of labour intensity for those courses.

Personal lifeGert has a family consisting of five children between the ages of 25 and 29: he has two children and his wife has three children. They live in Malden, close to Nijmegen. In his leisure time, Gert likes running. In the summer, he runs three times a week from his house via the Maas-Waal canal to the Maas and along the Maas over the dike to a water sports area in Plasmolen, Limburg, and back. He ran about a hundred ‘half marathons’ in his younger years and a ‘whole marathon’ once. Gert: “Running a whole marathon costs a lot of training time and I was dead tired afterwards, which is why I would never do that again.” Another hobby of Gert is cycling. If he goes to Nice (france) during his holidays, he takes his racing bike with him. He loves cycling there because of the weather, the mountains, and the multiple hairpin bends (U-shaped bends in the road).

Besides these hobbies, he also likes listening to music and reading books. He especially likes the singer-songwriters genre, about which his son, who went to the Rock academy in Tilburg, tells him a lot. He likes reading history books and novels. Gert thinks Arthur Japin is a very good writer. He likes the fact that this writer is very open-minded.

A piece of advice“econometrics is a beautiful study, which is very ‘cosy’ and as a student you are close to the members of the department. Try to bring out the best in yourself, because this study is a great starting point for your future. Try to understand everything that is presented to you and do not be satisfied with sixes.” |

Text by: Dimphy Hermans

gert Nieuwenhuis’s choices:

rU or Uvt?UvT

Univers or Nekst?Nekst

Computer or Pen and Paper?Computer

Word finder or Sudoku?Sudoku

tilburg or Nijmegen?Nijmegen

Summer or Winter olympics?Winter Olympics

Calculator or Mental Arithmetic? Calculator

Cooking Dinner or Mensa? Cooking Dinner

Mathematics or Econometrics?Mathematics

theory or Practice?Theory


I N - H o U S E P o W E r g E N E r A t o r S

e x c U R S I O N N U O N

At the beginning of the day, someone from the HR department told us about the activities of Nuon and the job opportunities they offer to econometricians. After this presentation, we were shown an animation video of what the world would look like according to Nuon in about fifty years from now. According to Nuon, we would be driving electric cars, producing our own power in-house in an environmental friendly way and electricity could be generated out of a wide variety of daily life tasks, such as the movement of a car or from pressure tiles in the sidewalk. This was also an introduction to the case, which was about in-house power generators.

After the introduction, Muammer cider, who did his master ’s thesis for econometrics on this subject and recently started working at Nuon, gave us an introduction to the case. We first held a brainstorm session on the relationship between demands and in-house power generators. The main issues were: How much space will it take? What to do with excess power? from what source should the power be generated to guarantee a constant supply?

After the brainstorm session, we were divided into groups to do an assessment. We had to answer about eight questions concerning the in-house power generator and we were supposed to come with a sort of conclusion for Nuon, answering the following question: Would it be wise for Nuon to invest in in-house power generators? I was in a group of six students, consisting of five students following the master ’s programme in econometrics at Tilburg University along with having done a bachelor ’s programme at the University of eindhoven. As can be expected, we got a little hung up in the technical details: is it possible to store the

produced energy? can you put excess energy on the network? However, Mr Huisman came to help us, although we only had a few minutes left, so we did not answer all the questions and we certainly did not reach any conclusion! Luckily we had two brave team mates who wanted to tell the other groups our conclusion. Besides, all other presentations were very short as well and not exceptionally in-depth.

When Mr cider started talking about the subject again, it became clear that he had expected more outcomes from our side on the case. However, there was obviously very little time and the questions were too specific to give a sufficient answer in the available time. He ended the session by presenting the outcomes as they should have been according to his master ’s thesis.

We ended the day with a drink and everyone had the chance to talk with employees of Nuon about the company. To conclude, this day was a perfect opportunity to get insight into what an internship at Nuon may look like. |

Name : Anne Michielsen

Age:23

begin studies:2009

on thursday 10 December, Asset | Econometrics held an excursion to Nuon for students following the course

Dynamic Capital Investment. We started the day with a presentation about Nuon and thereafter we had to

make a case about in-house power generators, which gave insight into the daily business at Nuon.

S u s t a i n a b l e p o w e r g e n e r a t i o n


o W t o W I N A b o t t l E o f W I N E

P A R e N T S e V e N I N G

Upon arrival, we received a cup of coffee in a comfortable salon, called Tilbury ’s, at Tilburg University. We sat down at a table with a few empty seats. We introduced ourselves to our table mates and found out that we shared a table with the parents of Harold van Heijst.

first, the members of the board introduced themselves to us and explained what the organisational structure of Asset | econometrics looks l ike. To our surprise, there appeared to be a large amount of committees and over forty active members. After the presentation of the board, all the chairmen of the committees came to the floor one after another. everyone told very enthusiastically about his or her committee.

We received a lot of information about the tasks of the several committees, such as the Drinks & Activities committee. frans fonville told something about the Nekst committee, which creates this magazine. He told about the many trials of a Nekst edition. In an appealing way he i l lustrated the stress a deadline of Nekst brings about, by throwing the many papers of the trial versions on the floor.

Our own son, Thomas Geelen, told about the Logistics Symposium committee. According to Thomas, the Logistics Symposium committee is the best committee there is and it has the best members. What else could be expected with such a nice son?

During the break we received drinks and nuts. After that, Ruud Hendrickx, a professor of the department of econometrics & OR, told us something about auctions in a compelling way. There are many types of auctions, such as first price auctions and

closed biddings. Some bottles of wine were available for auction and each time a bottle was sold by means of a different k ind of auction. I t appeared to be the house wine of Asset | econometrics. Because of the high quality of the wine, we were very keen on winning an auction, without paying too much of course. eventually, we went home with two bottles of wine.

After the auction, we participated in a tour through the esplanade building, in which the rooms of the study associations are established. Notable were the many posters of organised activities, which hung on the walls in the rooms. When we returned to Tilbury ’s, we saw a short video giving an impression of the daily l ife in the rooms of Asset | econometrics. We got a nice view on how things work within a study association.

At the end of the evening, we had a drink and a chat with the other parents. Thereafter, we went home by train, heading for Houten. During our journey back home, we looked back on a successful Parents evening and I would l ike to thank the board for organising this event. |

Name: Toine Geelen

father of:Thomas Geelen

In November 2009, my wife and I received an invitation for the Parents Evening of Asset | Econometrics. At first I

thought this invitation was a mistake, because we assumed that there would be no parent evenings after our son

graduated from high school. this evening, however, was meant for parents of active members of the study association.

So, my wife and I registered for the evening and on friday 11 December, we travelled from Houten to tilburg.

M e e t i n g a t T i l b u r y ’ s


r A b b I t S o N A C H r I S t M A S D I S H

A S S e T c H R I S T M A S G A L A

Before the gala, it was already clear to me that it would be an evening that nobody would forget. On my way to The Gallery, I learned by experience what a shower of salt and snow, caused by passing cars, looks l ike. fortunately, I was not the victim of this shower; the girls of the group were. Nevertheless, before we arrived at the gala, they had already cleaned their legs.

Upon arrival at The Gallery, it was a l ittle disappointing to see that there were only a few econometricians. Of course, the board of Asset | econometrics was present. A small group, however, does not mean that a party will be less successful! All requirements for a per fect gala were present: a glass of champagne to welcome everyone, a photographer taking pictures, a nice location, a DJ, snacks, and last but not least, lots of beer and wine for free! I think, for those who were not at the Asset christmas Gala, the latter will be a good reason for them to come this year. In contrast to the Orientation & Information Day of last November, not all rooms of The Gallery were open this time. The gala was held in the biggest room of The Gallery, in which the opening of the OID took place as

well . The room appeared large enough for a fantastic party ti l l two o’clock!

With about 200 people at the gala, the room was pleasantly f i l led and there were a lot of people dancing. The DJ did not play a lot of christmas music, but mostly modern popular music. One of the played songs was flappie by Youp van ‘t Hek. Personally, I really l ike this song. I noticed that lots of other people did as well . A guy standing next to me apparently loved this song so much that he could not stop singing it . However, his singing was a l ittle bit annoying for some other people. I think this guy really lost his rabbit in real l ife. Hopefully, he never got a rabbit on his christmas dish.

Without a doubt, you get to know a lot of people during such a party. Besides, networking with people from other studies gives a broader view on what is going on at TiSeM and you get to know the substance of the other studies as well .

Someone proposed the idea of an after party. At two o’clock, however, beer had flooded so richly that we would probably not reach the after party before closing time. I think that most of the party crashers agree with me. Another thing I l iked about the Asset christmas Gala was the feeling of closing the year by means of this party, since the christmas holiday started after the gala. After a year of hard work, the gala was a per fect start of my holiday.

To conclude, I hope to see you at the christmas Gala at the end of 2010! |

Name: Jorrit ten Brinke

Age:17

begin studies:2009

let me tell you about an event that you may have missed last year. It took place at the gallery on 17 December

2009. I can let you know that a lot of students from various studies were present. Moreover, everyone was

dressed up very nicely. Do you know what I am talking about? of course, I am talking about the Asset

Christmas gala!

M e a n d t h e l a d i e s

22 Nekst 3- March 2010

tNo, a company set up by the government, was glad to invite Nekst for an interview to let us find out what

this company has to offer. therefore we made our way to Delft, where one of their ICt offices is located, and

received a warm welcome from femke Hulsbergen, employee at tNo ICt. Settling in an empty room, with a

hot drink to warm us up, Nekst started the interview.

the companyTNO as a whole prides itself on its 4000 employees, divided over five different branches: ‘Building and foundation’, ‘Defence and Safety’, Quality of Life’, Industry and Technology’ and ‘IcT’. The latter has about 350 employees, of which about 300 work in Delft and the others in Groningen. TNO IcT cooperates with the aforementioned branches as well. This makes the work to be done very diverse and interesting.

As mentioned before, TNO was set up by the government. Why would the government do that? femke: “TNO is a Dutch research organisation designed to develop knowledge and help companies to use this knowledge to innovate. for example, a few years ago you were unable to watch video clips on your mobile phone. We helped to figure out how this could be accomplished and showed the result to the companies, after which they started producing such phones.

Although we were set up by the government, we work independently and therefore can do unbiased research. The only limitation for TNO is that the company is not allowed to compete with the commercial companies. for example, if a company is developing innovation plans and we turn out to be cheaper than the commercial companies, we cannot compete with that company on the offer. We charge a fixed price for our services and we are allowed to make a three percent profit only.”

the employeeAfter hearing all this information about the company, we would like to know some more about femke: “I studied econometrics and followed a master ’s programme in Marketing at the erasmus University Rotterdam from 2002 up until 2008, which means that I have

worked here for two years now. Before that, I studied commercial economics in Arnhem, which focused on market research. I did an internship at a market research company and the quantitative side of it sparked my interest. Thus I ended up studying econometrics.”

How did femke immediately end up at TNO though? femke: “I wanted a combination of research and consultancy, but I never really thought about it, as I was busy graduating. I had stored an advertisement on Intermediair and got an offer telling me to take a look at the vacancies TNO had. I had already received an offer from another company, but thought it would be best to see what TNO had to offer as well. In the end, and that was quite a tough decision, I decided to work here and before christmas my contract was signed.”

When you start at TNO, you will be guided from the first day onwards. every three to four weeks your manager will invite you for a chat, in which you can discuss your work, the projects you are working on and how you feel about things. Within the company, there are several courses you can take. However, if you want to do something besides these courses, you can ask your manager as well and he will usually comply.

femke’s contract was signed for forty hours a week and she usually sticks to those neatly. Sometimes she works thirty minutes or an hour extra, though she rarely spends her weekends working. As an early bird, she arrives around half past seven in the morning and because of all the things she works on for the past few weeks, she leaves the office around six o’clock. To compensate for that, she takes quite a few holidays: Malaysia, Ardennes, Dolomites, multiple weekends off, with all of these in just one year. You get

A V E Y o U r o W N P A t H A t t N o

Name: Femke Hulsbergen

Age:31

Position: Consultant

B U S I N e S S I N T e R V I e W T N O


33 days off, but if you want to, you can ask for extra days, if it does not disrupt your projects.

If she could have worked anywhere else, where would she have gone? This question results in a sigh and some deep frowns. “I am not sure… The thing I like most about my job is that you are in close contact with the client you are working with. The process of interacting with one another to find out what it is they want us to develop is very interesting. The consultancy part is what appeals to me most and that is something you can do almost everywhere in the Netherlands. The nice thing about TNO is the fact that you generate knowledge. Although I like that, I would not even consider working at a university, because I like the commercial side of things.”

the teamProjects are done in ‘working teams’, which means you all work on developing a certain product together, though the independent tasks among the team members may differ greatly. femke mostly works

with mathematicians, because of the quantitative side of her work. Most of them are fellow econometricians, mathematicians or IcT-skilled people. econometricians are definitely needed: she gives us some examples of the many vacancies for econometricians in all branches of TNO. And for a reason: femke uses her econometric knowledge regularly. femke: “I have to do a regression analysis quite often. In such cases, I find myself wondering which type of regression is the best to use. I think the most important aspect is the way of thinking that the study econometrics teaches you, the way of analysing data, thinking about it and looking at it from a certain perspective.

Part of her work is guiding several working teams in order to make everything work, which she likes a lot. Of course, there are a lot of different possibilities when working at TNO. for example, you can decide to become a consultant, focusing on interaction with your clients and advising them. Another road to take is one of a specialist, who knows all about a

certain field of knowledge. ‘Marketeers’ can be found within TNO as well, focusing on finding those clients who are in need of advice. Whatever road you take, TNO will offer you courses to help you grow. Of course, if you think that this is not enough, you can get your own personal coach to develop competences or you can take extra courses you find suitable.

There is an employees association as well, which organises monthly drinks and activities for its members. for example, they have been to other branches to see what happens over there in terms of research, after which a drink took place. Sometimes employees themselves come up with ideas for organising events, such as poker tournaments or a dance night.

Personal informationBesides travelling, femke has another bunch of hobbies: cycling, walking, photographing, playing games, diving, playing squash and yoga. She does not read that much, but once she is reading a good book, she will pick it up whenever she has some time to read. She admires people who go all the way for their passion, such as sportsmen. However, this is not something she would easily do herself.

finally, she gives us some advice: “Try writing your bachelor ’s or master ’s thesis at a company, for it can help you to find out whether you like that company or not and to discover what it is like to work at that company. Such opportunities can be found at TNO as well.” She also thinks that it is very useful to become active. “Try organising activities or something similar, as companies are interested in such experience as well. And of course: choose a job you like!” |

Text by: Fang Qi WuA g r e a t a t m o s p h e r e a t T N O

TNO_CC_365_Adv_A4_Sebastiaan.indd 1 28-03-2007 14:17:05


E l E C t I o N S

c O L U M N

Let me consider some topics that will not make it to mainstream discussions. Party leaders are important figures in general elections. You see their face on television and in the papers every day and they are believed to be representing the ideas of their parties. They are conveying those ideas to the voters, who can then make an educated decision on the policies they want the next government to carry out. At least, this is said. In reality, the proper way for voters to reveal their opinion about issues concerning general policy is by means of local elections. Issues like Uruzgan and the economic crisis are used by voters to decide for whom to vote in local elections. General elections, on the other hand, are used as a popularity contest among party leaders.1

I suspect my grandmother of using this strategy. Last week she was reviewing the policies of the local parties, and found one she particularly liked. Within five minutes, however, she decided to vote for cDA, because she agreed with Balkenende about the mission in Uruzgan. Although my grandmother claims that she votes cDA because of this reason, I am not sure about the causality. Research has shown that the human mind needs to ‘make sense’ out of things. In some experiments, the researcher conducting the experiment is deliberately being rude. He plays his role well: when asked afterwards, everyone dislikes him. Now researchers added another element: they asked a new group of subjects to donate money to help them with their research. When asked about the rude researcher, they apparently had a different opinion: they liked him. Because our mind cannot understand why we would donate money to a researcher we dislike, our mind reverses the conclusion: we liked this guy after all. The same probably happened in case of my grandmother. She has always voted cDA, so she should definitely agree with Balkenende. “If I vote cDA, then it must be because I like and trust the people running that party,” her mind concludes.

There is also another persistent rumour regarding elections. It has been said many times that money buys elections. There is a clear reasoning behind this line of thought, which sounds very convincing. If you are willing and able to spend a lot of money on your campaign, then you will most likely buy a lot of advertising time. furthermore, having money is in itself a clear sign of success. Because people know you very well, they are more likely to vote for you. Besides, if you need to assess candidates, you will probably trust a successful person in fixing the problems of your country, don’t you? There is very convincing evidence pointing to this conclusion, according to advocates of this theory. Almost every man elected as president in the United States of America2 outspent his direct opponent.

But once again, the causality should be reversed. Suppose you have two candidates, one is favoured by voters and the other one is an underdog. If you are a large company trying to gain goodwill from the new president, you are much better off supporting the campaign of the winner. There is usually no reason for supporting the underdog. There is evidence suggesting this really happens. consider the campaign of Barack Obama, who got a lot of money for his campaign, while his Democratic opponent, Hillary clinton, had more money at the beginning of the campaign period. Besides, a lot of millionaires have tried to run for president in the USA, but most of them did not even survive the preliminary rounds.

It is clear that the mechanisms behind elections may not be as grim as you might think at first sight. Who to vote for in the popularity contest in the Netherlands? I might just look at policy instead... |

1. Attentive readers might wonder: “If this is the case, when can I vote if

I am concerned with local issues?” even more attentive readers already

know that this is impossible.

2. for women, the sample size is equal to zero.

Name: Gerwald van Gulick

Position:PhD Candidate

Since the beginning of 2010, the air is filled with the buzz of elections. We already knew there were going to be

municipal elections, but a lack of trust over Uruzgan has caused the government to collapse, necessitating general

elections on 9 June 2010. Elections are very exciting for econometricians, as we can analyse our own voting power,

consider the power of the various parliamentary parties, or we can muse about the obstacles in coalition forming.


When looking for an internship in the field of operations research, an interesting project

in the ornamental wholesale attracted my attention. flowers are a famous Dutch export

product and our country represents sixty percent of the world’s trade in flowers and

plants.

the flower tradeThe flower auctions in the Netherlands are the heart of the world’s flower trade, with 39 clocks operating every day. The three biggest auctions are located in Aalsmeer, Rijnsburg, and Naaldwijk. Near these auctions, several wholesalers in flowers and plants are located, such as cash and carriers, order line drivers (Dutch: lijnrijders), and exporters. These wholesalers have clients in the Netherlands, for example florists, garden centres, and supermarkets, to which 12 percent of all products are sold; the other 88 percent are exported.

The supply chain of flowers is shown in figure 1. flowers first go from grower to auction, where they are sold. After the auction, flowers and plants are transported to the wholesaler via internal logistics (in case the transaction takes place at a nearby auction) or via road transport (from another auction). currently, most of the products are present in front of the clock during auctioning, but auctioning based on images or just information becomes more common. Another development is the increase in popularity of other ways of buying, such as buying directly from growers (via e-trade) or by means of long term contracts.

Since flower auctions exist in the Netherlands, auctioning takes place early in the morning, starting at 6:00 hours. from a wholesalers’ perspective, this may not be the most efficient auction time anymore. Therefore, the trade organisation of wholesalers in flowers and plants (VGB) initiated the project ‘Other auction times’. In this project, the effects of other auction times are

analysed for wholesalers and other parts in the supply chain. Studies were performed regarding different types of wholesalers.

My research took place at the wholesaler ‘Hamifleurs’, which is a big cut flower exporter located in Naaldwijk. This company buys most of the flowers by using the auction clock. clients of Hamifleurs are mainly wholesalers in other european countries.

Problems in the current situationThe problems that the wholesaler experiences in the current auction system can be split into logistical, commercial, and social problems. In logistics, the sorting process cannot be arranged efficiently due to a discontinuous delivery from the auction and a long time between the moment of buying and delivery. client orders may be completed late and may be incomplete when transportation needs to start. In the commercial area, pricing is a problem. At a certain time, the company stops purchasing at the other auction locations. from that moment onwards, everything is purchased at the Naaldwijk auction and demand increases over there. The current auction times also cause the social problem of unattractive working times. especially purchasers have to start very early in the morning.

future scenariosBased on three scenarios, stated by the VGB, the effect of other auction times was analysed. My research analysed in which scenario the company performs best in logistics, commercial, and social fields.

I M U l A t I o N I N t H E D U t C H

f l o W E r t r A D E

Name: Yvonne Blom

Age:23

begin studies: 2004

P R A c T I c A L R e P O R T


1. Optimised logistics with the current auction times. In this case, products are generally delivered at the wholesaler’s location one hour earlier than in the current situation and distribution is demand-driven.

2. The current auction system moved to the afternoon one day earlier. The products are in the auction building during auctioning. They are delivered the next morning. Delivery is done earlier, because the destination is known earlier.

3. Virtual auctioning in the afternoon, while the flowers are still at the grower. They are delivered at the auction building in the evening and go to the wholesaler’s location in the morning. Here, delivery is done earlier as well.

All three scenarios were analysed for Hamifleurs using a set of Key Performance Indicators. These KPIs were defined using the Balanced Scorecard and they can be divided in the categories financial, customer, Internal Business Process, and Organisation. examples of these KPIs are costs, throughput time of order handling, lead time, product freshness, and attractiveness of the work. A part

of the KPIs is qualitative. The qualitative KPI values were determined on the basis of interviews with the company. The quantitative KPIs were determined using a simulation model.

ModelThe logistics system of Hamifleurs is set up as follows. When products from the auction arrive at the wholesaler’s location, they are stickered and checked on quality. If they are not sold yet, flowers are placed in inventory. Otherwise, buckets are placed on the sorter such that they go to the exit lane to which a certain client is assigned. In case a client requires extra handling, this is done first. extra handling can be, for example, packing in boxes, bundling or placing flowers in plastic covers. At the sorter exit lanes, the buckets are placed on trolleys. When a client order is finished, it is checked again before it goes in the truck for transportation.

first of all, all these processes were simplified in a conceptual model, as shown in the picture. After that, a simulation model using the programme Arena was developed to analyse the process in the current situation and in the three future scenarios. To determine the

input for simulation, data was required on, for instance, processing times of the processes in the system, client orders, and inventory levels.

resultsAfter verification of the base model, given the current statistics, the scenarios were run. The model outputs, such as throughput time, ready time of the system, and utilisation of the sorter, were used to calculate the values of the KPIs in the different scenarios. After determination of all values, the list of indexes was discussed with the company.

The third scenario, virtual auctioning in the afternoon, turned out to be the best scenario for Hamifleurs. With earlier deliveries, the logistical process can be arranged more efficiently, such that handling is finished earlier in time. flowers go to the auction in the evening instead of in the morning (the second scenario), so the third scenario also yields a higher product quality.

Together with the results of the other studies for wholesalers and other parts in the chain, an advice will be given to the board of the VGB on the best future scenarios. |

Simulation in the Dutch flower trade

Yvonne blom 23 2004

When looking for an internship in the field of Operations Research, an interesting project in the ornamental wholesale attracted my attention. Flowers are a famous Dutch export product and our country represents 60 percent of the world’s trade in flowers and plants.

The flower trade

The flower auctions in the Netherlands are the heart of the world’s flower trade, with 39 clocks operating every day. The three biggest auctions are located in Aalsmeer, Rijnsburg, and Naaldwijk. Near these auctions, several wholesalers in flowers and plants are located, such as cash and carriers, order line drivers (Dutch: lijnrijders), and exporters. These wholesalers have clients in the Netherlands, for example florists, garden centres, and supermarkets, to which 12 percent of all products are sold; the other 88 percent are exported.

The supply chain of flowers is shown in figure 1. Flowers first go from grower to auction, where they are sold. After the auction, flowers and plants are transported to the wholesaler via internal logistics (in case the transaction takes place at a nearby auction) or via road transport (from another auction). Currently, most of the products are present in front of the clock during auctioning, but auctioning based on images or just information becomes more common. Another development is the increase in popularity of other ways of buying, such as buying directly from growers (via E-trade) or by means of long term contracts.

Grower Auction Wholesaler Client

Figure 1: the flower supply chain

Since flower auctions exist in the Netherlands, auctioning takes place early in the morning, starting at 6:00 hours. From a wholesalers’ perspective, this may not be the most efficient auction time anymore. Therefore, the trade organisation of wholesalers in flowers and plants (VGB) initiated the project ‘Other auction times’. In this project, the effects of other auction times are analysed for wholesalers and other parts in the supply chain. Studies were performed regarding different types of wholesalers.

My research took place at the wholesaler ‘Hamifleurs’, which is a big cut flower exporter located in Naaldwijk. This company buys most of the flowers by using the auction clock. Clients of Hamifleurs are mainly wholesalers in other European countries.

Problems in the current situation

The problems that the wholesaler experiences in the current auction system can be split into logistical, commercial, and social problems. In logistics, the sorting process cannot be arranged efficiently due to a discontinuous delivery from the auction and a long time between the moment of buying and delivery. Client orders may be completed late and may be incomplete when transportation needs to start. In the commercial area, pricing is a problem. At a certain time, the

F i g u r e 1 : T h e f l o w e r s u p p l y c h a i n

F i g u r e 2 : C o n c e p t u a l m o d e l


C t I V E W I t H C A P I t A l A

A c T I V e M e M B e R S M e e T I N G

On a Wednesday evening in January, not that cold for the time of the year, seventeen active members responded to this invitation of the board. We gathered together in a cosy room on the third floor of café Karel. After we had sat down and had had a cool drink or a hot chocolate, Harold van Heijst, chairman of the board, opened the meeting. He welcomed everybody and explained the purpose of the evening. At that moment, we realised that it was really going to be an Active members meeting, with capital A. The board came up with three actual themes and it was up to us to discuss them. This made it impossible to just sit down and wait for what was going to be said. We had to think ourselves.

for the first theme, we had to think about the question what we should do to get the international - mainly chinese - students more involved in our association. Therefore, we were split up in three groups of about six people. first, we started with brainstorming about the issue and after that, every group had to present its ideas. Brainstorming turned out be quite fun. We came up with the ideas of organising a karaoke night, arranging a firework show and changing ourselves into a chinese dragon during chinese New Year. Well, maybe those plans were not very realistic… Thereafter, it was time for the presentations. Almost every presentation resulted in a highly-involved plenary discussion, in which each opinion triggered reactions from others. There were a lot of different views, but also a lot of interesting ideas.

The second theme, which we were about to discuss, was the issue of offering tutorships to econometrics students. The main question was whether we should let this be done via the MAK, as has been done up till now, or via Asset | econometrics itself. Groups

were shuffled, so we got the opportunity to share ideas with members from other years. New brainstorm sessions took place and during the presentations, we could roughly distinguish two camps: the one in favour of offering tutorships via the MAK, the other camp in favour of offering tutorships via Asset | econometrics. Main advocates of the MAK-camp (no verbal joke) argued that the MAK has more experience in organising tutorships and a sufficient amount of participants to keep this profitable. Advocates of the Astrics-camp argued that Asset | econometrics is an easy way to get into contact with other econometrics students and has better insight into which older students are capable of giving extra lessons. Again, contrary views and a lot of interesting ideas.

for the final theme, our opinions were asked about the lay-out of the wonderful magazine, which you are reading right now: Nekst. During this final session, it seemed as if every econometrician suddenly turned into a graphical designer. Often heard phrases were: ‘Put a photo on the cover’, ’Use the vector image of the new banner’, ‘No green, but light blue’ and so on. However, there was a common agreement on one issue: it is an illusion that we would be able to change the lay-out in a day and a night. In the best case, some of the ideas may be implemented next academic year.

To conclude, I think that it was an interesting and fun meeting, in which a lot of active members discussed and got inspired by each other’s ideas. In this way, we also got to know each other in a different setting. Hopefully, some of the ideas as presented during the Active Members Meeting will become policy in the future. |

Name: Jeroen Dalderop

Age:19

begin studies: 2008

What would any association be without its members thinking actively about the directions the association should

follow? Members who feel committed to the quality of the activities, which the association organises? And members

who are willing to share ideas about what should be done and what should be left? Presumably not very much. With

that in mind, the board of Asset | Econometrics invited all its active members for the yearly Active Members Meeting.


C A N W E V o t E P l E A S E ?

G e N e R A L M e M B e R S M e e T I N G A N D D R I N K

When gathering together at The Gallery at 19:00 hours, it turned out that the quorum was not reached. This meant that we had to wait for another fifteen minutes for the next meeting to begin. At the beginning of the meeting, Harold van Heijst appointed Janneke van Schijndel as voting commissioner, although it was already announced that there would be nothing to vote for. If there, however, would be an unexpected voting necessary, then a voting commissioner was needed. At the end of the meeting, it turned out that there was indeed nothing to vote for, since there were no unexpected problems.

After having listened to an overview of the past activities and the upcoming events, we got an overview of the points of focus of the board. One point of focus was the new house style of our association. At that moment, the main house style was just finished and the result was presented. We noticed a new big pop-up wall behind the board, which replaced the old one that still had the TeV logo on it. I think the new house style looks great.

Another point of focus was the integration in faculty association Asset, which seems to go quite well in general. There were some minor issues there, but the board members mentioned

that they were still working on those matters. The last point was about the internationalisation and integration of foreign students within our association. This turned out to be still quite difficult, but there was already some progress made in January. The board announced that our association even had two foreign active members at that time.

When all the points of focus were discussed, a financial overview was presented. financially spoken, our association is quite healthy and there are even more funds available than expected at the beginning of the academic year. During this agenda item, there are always a lot of discussions. The most important discussion was about the subsidy of the department. In the first GMM, this subsidy was divided over the different activities. During that meeting, it was proposed to put the subsidy under a separate entry. During this GMM, however, people suggested that the subsidy should be divided over the activities again. I am very curious to know what Anouk Rennen, the treasurer of the board, will do next time. All in all, the finance monitoring committee concluded that there were no problems detected in the ongoing financial issues.

After Harold closed the meeting, it was time for some less serious business. first of all, most of us took a better look at the pop up wall. After we approved this wall, the board started to clean up and the members went to café Babbus. We were almost an hour earlier than expected, since the GMM did not last too long. As more members were entering the pub, most of us got their first beers. Around half past ten, the board arrived and everyone received a glass of champagne, which was quickly followed by a free barrel of beer. Although there were not that many discussions during the GMM, it was still an interesting meeting and I hope to see you all during the next GMM. |

Name: Harmen Boersma

Age:21

begin studies:2007

It seems a long time ago that the second general Members Meeting (gMM) of this academic year took place

on Wednesday 27 January. During this meeting, the board members of Asset | Econometrics elaborated on

what they have done during the past months and had to indicate if there were any big problems for the

future.

T h e n e w p o p - u p w a l l


After years of preparation, the chip card for the public transport system is currently being introduced. Dutch

students have already received this card as a replacement of the former student travel card. Nekst deemed it

time to dedicate an article to this chip card.

The chip card for publ ic t ranspor t (Dutch: OV-chipk aar t , but we wi l l refer to i t as ‘OV chip card ’ ) , i s the newly introduced means of payment for the publ ic t ranspor t system in the Nether lands and wi l l in due t ime replace a l l o ld means of payment . The OV chip card is a so-cal led ‘smar t card ’, which contains a chip with data on i t . I t i s a k ind of bank card that can be used as a means of payment by loading i t with credit (euros) or with a t ravel produc t .

In fac t , there is not only a s ingle t ype of OV chip card, but there are three t ypes avai lable : a personal , an anonymous, and a disposable card. This i s done in order to meet the di f ferent demands a user can have. The personal card suits you when you travel with publ ic t ranspor t on a regular bas is . With a personal card, you can get automatic discounts i f you are e l ig ible for one and you can automatical ly re load your card v ia your bank account . I f you just occas ional ly use publ ic t ranspor t , you can buy an anonymous card, as this card contains no personal data and can therefore be lent to others, for instance fami ly members. Last ly, the disposable card is meant for people who normal ly do not use publ ic t ranspor t , but use i t a few t imes. I t i s expec ted that most ly tour ists wi l l buy such cards.

At this point in t ime, i t i s s t i l l poss ible to use the old means of payment nex t to the OV chip card such as the t ick et str ip (Dutch: st r ippenk aar t ) in most areas of the Nether lands. In some regions,

however, the OV chip card is not even of f ic ia l ly in use yet . for instance, in T i lburg i t i s not poss ible to check in or out us ing your OV chip card when travel l ing by bus. R ight now, showing your student OV chip card wi l l a l low you on the bus. These issues are supposed

to change on 1 July, when you should be able to use the chip card ever y where in the Nether lands. The reason for introducing the OV chip card is that i t has cer ta in advantages over the old system with t ick ets . One of the advantages is that you wi l l be able to t ravel with the publ ic t ranspor t system by only us ing one card compared to the di f ferent t ick ets for t ra ins, busses, and the metro at this moment . Another advantage is

that at the t ime the OV chip card wi l l be introduced, t ra in and metro stat ions wi l l only be access ible through entrance gates. This wi l l not only put a stop to fare dodging, but i t wi l l a lso provide more safet y, as stat ions are no longer f reely access ible. Bes ides these advantages, t ranspor t companies wi l l be able to see how many people t ravel at cer ta in t imes and in what di rec t ion. This mak es i t poss ible to improve matching capacit y and demand, especia l ly dur ing rush hours.

StudentsIn the past , s tudents used to get an OV student card, which was val id for publ ic t ranspor t in week ends or on weekdays. Students could choose one of these two opt ions depending on their preferences. Al l you had to do was showing this card when ask ed for and i t would a l low you to t ravel for f ree or with a discount . As of Januar y 2010, the OV student card was supposed to be no longer val id and instead the OV chip card for students would have to be used.

The OV chip card for Dutch students is an example of a personal card and is d istr ibuted by DUO ( former ly k nown as IB Group) . I t has to be loaded with a t ravel produc t for week ends or weekdays, so i t bas ical ly works the same as the OV student card. However, th is t ravel produc t caused problems. At f i rst , i t was planned that ever y student could t ravel with his or her OV chip card with a t ravel produc t loaded on i t f rom 1 Januar y onwards. This

H I P C A r D f o r P U b l I C

t r A N S P o r tS P e c I A L


deadl ine proved to be impossible to meet .

A n e w a r ra n g e m e nt wa s p ro p o s e d : t h e o l d O V s t u d e nt c a rd wa s s t i l l va l i d i n J a n u a r y 2 0 1 0 a n d s t u d e nt s h a d to c h a rg e t h e i r c h i p c a rd w i t h a t rave l p ro d u c t at a c h a rg i n g p o i nt a s s o o n a s p o s s i b l e . Th e s e c h a rg i n g p o i nt s , w h i c h we re n e w l y i n s t a l l e d, e x p e r i e n ce d a l o t o f te c h n i c a l d i f f i c u l t i e s . Th e y we re o f te n o u t o f o rd e r a n d w h e n t h e y d i d wo r k , i t wa s s o m e t i m e s i m p o s s i b l e to l o a d a t rave l p ro d u c t o n yo u r O V c h i p c a rd. Th e l at te r p ro b l e m o c c u r re d d u r i n g r u s h h o u r s . D u r i n g t h e s e h o u r s , to o m a ny p e o p l e t r i e d to l o a d a t rave l p ro d u c t at t h e s a m e t i m e a n d t h e s ys te m t h at h a d to

co o rd i n ate t h e s e t ra n s a c t i o n s co u l d n o t h a n d l e t h e t ra f f i c . As a re s u l t , n o t e ve n h a l f o f a l l t h e D u tc h s t u d e nt s h a d co l l e c te d t h e i r t rave l p ro d u c t h a l f way J a n u a r y o f t h i s ye a r.

fo r m e r m i n i s te r P l a s te r k s aw n o o t h e r o p t i o n t h a n to p o s t p o n e t h e d e a d l i n e fo r l o a d i n g a t rave l p ro d u c t fo r i n d e f i n i te t i m e. L ate r o n , w h e n te c h n i c a l d i f f i c u l t i e s we re ove rco m e, t h e n e w d e a d l i n e wa s s e t to 1 6 M a rc h . fu r t h e r m o re, s t u d e nt s a re s t i m u l ate d to l o a d a t rave l p ro d u c t o n t h e i r c a rd s by i nt ro d u c i n g p r i ze s t h at c a n b e wo n i f s t u d e nt s l o a d a t rave l p ro d u c t . St u d e nt s c a n w i n a s k i i n g va c at i o n o r a n A p p l e i Pa d.

Problems and crit icismThe introduc t ion of the OV chip card did not go ver y smoothly, which led to negat ive publ ic i t y in the media and complaining OV chip card users. Publ ic t ranspor t passengers’ organisat ion ROVeR requested an invest igat ion regarding these problems. Some problems that occurred are : broken equipment, credit being wr itten off unjust i f ied, and an increase in pr ices on some tracks. Something else that can be seen as a problem, is the fac t that when you want to wave someone goodbye at the stat ion, you need an OV chip card to check in . Af ter check ing in , you only have thir t y minutes to check out or e lse you wi l l automatical ly pay a fee.

F i g u r e 1 : R e g i o n s w h e r e t h e O V c h i p c a r d i s a l r e a d y i n t r o d u c e d

F i g u r e 2 : O V c h i p c a r d i n p r a c t i c e

Het doel is dat je zelf initiatief neemt. Ga naar aegon.nl/werk

Eerlijk over werken bij AEGON.

200.00.060 Campus adv_210x297.indd 1 7/8/08 3:32:37 PM


The student card has some speci f ic problems. At the moment, i t i s s t i l l unk nown in what way the system should process a for t y percent discount for people t ravel l ing together with a student in possess ion of an OV chip card. Another recent development is the r ise of complaints f rom students that their pr ivac y is being harmed as they can only have a personal card.

The pr ivac y issue only comes into play when a personal card is used. When check ing in or out , data is being col lec ted about the journey that has been made. I f you travel with a personal card, your name wi l l be added to these data and a l l of the data wi l l be stored for seven years . Therefore, some people are worr ied as they do not k now how safe the database is and for what purposes this information wi l l be used. The M inistr y of Transpor t , Publ ic works and Water Management is of the opinion that no harm is being done regarding the pr ivac y of users of the OV chip card. According to this inst i tut ion,

the t ravel information and personal information are stored separately and only i f absolutely necessar y, these data wi l l be l ink ed.

The M inistr y suggests that an anonymous card can be used i f people st i l l have objec t ions regarding the pr ivac y. However, th is i s not a fu l l - f ledged a l ternat ive as discounts cannot be t ranslated to an anonymous card. Students, for example, can get an anonymous card, but they wi l l never be able to t ravel for f ree as in the case of us ing the student OV chip card.

Another problem that arose even before the OV chip card was introduced on a large scale was the issue of crack ing the chip card. I t turned out that the OV chip card can eas i ly be crack ed by specia l ists in the f ie ld of computer secur i t y. crack ing the card mak es i t poss ible to manipulate the data on the card. The quest ion remains whether cr iminals wi l l ac tual ly be interested in OV chip card f raud as i t only involves smal l amounts of money.

oV chip c ard in prac ticeI f ever ything works as i t i s supposed to work , then the OV chip card is a change for the better : i t works easy and ef f ic ient . In prac t ice, however, there are st i l l some problems that have to be solved and the personnel of t ranspor tat ion companies has to get used to this new phenomenon as wel l . Some staf f i s obviously confused due to a l l the changes. Tak e for instance the conduc tor who threatened a student to f ine him, because this student did not load his t ravel produc t on the card in Januar y. I t wi l l def in i te ly tak e some t ime before the OV chip card wi l l be integrated. However, a l l beginnings are di f f icult and the OV chip card is cer ta inly no except ion. |

Te x t by : Te s s B e u ke r s & B a r t K r u i z e

F i g u r e 3 : A c h i p c a r d f o r p u b l i c t r a n s p o r t

Preface

3

Dear fellow econometrician,

At secondary school you were probably wondering what you wanted to study. Out of many possibilities you have chosen econometrics. At the beginning of your studies in econometrics you get a lot of courses in mathematics. But what can you do with all that mathematical knowledge? To give you more information about the future possibilities within econometrics, we have organised the Orientation & Information Day (OID).

This year the OID will take place in Tilburg at the Gallery on Wednesday 4 November 2009. During the OID you will have the opportunity to get to know different companies who all represent one or more of the master programmes. These companies will present themselves by means of presentations and cases.

On the OID you can orientate yourself on the labour market. There will also be different programmes specifi ed to your specifi c year of study. Next to the presentation and cases, the fi rst and second year students will also be informed about the coming years of their study programme. For the third year and master students there is both a CV session and a speed date session.

On page 5 you can fi nd a complete overview of the day’s programme.

If you want to know what the coming years of your studies will bring you and if you want to get some information about the companies who might be your future employer, then subscribe yourself at www.Asset-Econometrics.nl. When subscribing, you will be asked to indicate your preferences for the presentations and cases you would like to attend.

I hope to see you all on 4 November at the Gallery for the OID 2009!

On behalf of the Orientation & Information Day Committee,

Claudia Rommens

Committee 2009

2

From left to right: Marleen Balvert, Tycho Speekenbrink,

Evelien Kerkmeijer, Bart Kruize, Claudia Rommens, Pascal Heuijerjans, Stèphanie van Breda

Claudia Rommens ChairmanTycho Speekenbrink SecretaryBart Kruize TreasurerMarleen Balvert External AffairsPascal Heuijerjans External AffairsEvelien Kerkmeijer External AffairsStèphanie van Breda Coordinator

B o o k o f F a c e s

B u s i n e s s R e s e a r c h P r o g r a m m e

O r i e n t a t i o n & I n f o r m a t i o n D a y 0 9 - 1 0

E d u c a t i o n

I n t r o d u c t i o n A c t i v i t y 0 9 - 1 0

D r i n k s & A c t i v i t i e s

( A c t i v e ) M e m b e r s D a y

B o a r d A s s e t | E c o n o m e t r i c s 0 9 - 1 0

P r o m o t i o n

A c t i v e M e m b e r s W e e k e n dF i n a n c e E x p e d i t i o n

L o g i s t i c s S y m p o s i u m

A c t u a r y D a y o f T i l b u r g

N e k s t

F r e s h m e n

F o o t b a l l S y m p o s i u m

E c o n o m i c B u s i n e s s w e e k s T i l b u r g


t H E g o o D I E - b A g A N D t H E U g lY

A c T U A R Y D A Y O f T I L B U R G

Although orientation days l ike this one are pr imari ly organised for long term gains, l ike helping you make a sound career choice, I cannot help but f inding the shor t term gain in the form of a goodie bag at least as impor tant. After al l , I st i l l am a human being (my thanks go to Wim van Ger ven of the Actuarial Inst itute for reminding me of this during his presentation) .

The bag itself was provided by TiasNimbas: the Business School of T i lburg University. I t was in the building of this organisation that most of the actuar y day took place. Not without a reason we soon found out, as TiasNimbas was proud to present a master ’s programme in actuarial sciences in col laboration with the Actuarial Inst itute. Prof. Dr Schumacher tr ied to promote this programme, although his stor y was ful l of uncer tainties s ince the programme is st i l l in development. I t seemed to be a decent programme to me, especial ly for those pursuing a career as an actuar y and who are luck y enough to f ind a company that wants to suppor t them.

When I looked inside the bag, I found a ver y useful mini-mouse provided by Achmea. Such a big insurance company cer tainly had to be present on a day l ike this. Achmea mainly told about the company as an actuarial inst itute, which was ver y interesting. Besides, I was luck y enough to be in a group with an Achmea actuar y during the pub quiz and he explained me a lot about being an actuar y.

After st ick ing my head a l i tt le bit fur ther into the bag, I found an Admira water bottle. To me, Admira was the least famil iar company of the day. After a shor t

introduction to the company, the f loor was for two of their actuaries to talk about their jobs. The f irst one was special ised in pensions and showed how this area is moving these days. The second one was a woman from Hungar y. She showed us one of her models made in a computer programme I never heard of before. Her model made me think of a joke I once heard: “ There are two things you are better off not watching in the mak ing: sausages and econometric est imates.”

Digging even fur ther down the bag, I found a big jar ful l of nuts. One might wonder what k ind of company gives me a jar of nuts. Well , no company does. I t was actual ly the trophy my teammates and I received for winning the aforementioned pub quiz. I t was a nice informal activity after an incredibly formal day.

The f irst speaker of the day, an independent actuar y, did not put anything in the goodie bag. Besides, I ran out of s i l ly br idges anyway. He told about his career and the oppor tunit ies you have being an actuar y. He presented a var iety of projects he was work ing on. To me, i t al l sounded ver y interesting.

To conclude, the Actuar y Day of Ti lburg was a great day and I would l ike to thank the committee members responsible for organising this day as well as the companies that were present: Achmea, Admira, Aon, and Deloitte. Thanks to this day, I have a better picture of what an actuar y does. However, I got the idea that actuaries do not have to work hard and st i l l get a lot of money. I t looks l ike a world in which you can have one’s cake and eat i t too. Tempting… |

Name: Vincent Lous

Age:22

begin studies:2009

on 4 february, I got all dressed up for the Actuary Day of tilburg organised by Asset | Econometrics. If you

would have asked me what an actuary does before that day, I would have probably mumbled something

about insurance, premiums, and some other loose words in that direction. this day came as a blessing to me,

as I want to pursue a master’s degree in Econometrics, but I have no clue which one to choose.


roland Daamen (First year student)I mainly see disadvantages regarding the introduction of the OV chip card. Apart from the problems during the introduction of the card, there is hardly any difference between the old and the new situation: you still do not have to check in and out when travelling neither by bus nor by train. However, I think that if students would have to check in and out as well, this would really annoy me. especially because there is no check-out post on the platform of Tilburg West station when arriving in the direction of the university. This would mean that hundreds of students would have to use one check-out post at the opposite side of the platform at the same time. This will cost five minutes and probably even more. Moreover, if your bus arrives a bit late at the railway station, you might not be able to catch your train anymore, because about sixty people have to check out in the bus first and after that you would also have to check in for the train again.

Ad van Herpen (Second year student)The OV chip card: a masterpiece for using public transport in the Netherlands. You only need an OV chip card for travelling by bus, train, tram, or metro. Before, you had to buy a ticket – most of the time you even had to buy a ticket strip with a minimum of ten tickets on it – for the bus and thereafter a ticket for the train. Therefore, it is not surprising that by the time a conductor wants to see your ticket, you have lost it somewhere in the train or bus. The OV chip card will solve a lot of these problems. However, the introduction of the card was very disappointing. The goal was to have all students in the Netherlands travelling with the OV chip card from february 2010 onwards. Therefore, you had to activate your OV chip card somewhere in the Netherlands during January. However, I could not find anything about the whereabouts of such an activation spot on the website www.ov-chipkaart.nl. Other students told me where to activate my OV chip card, but I do not think that this is according to the plans of the government.

Whitney Pattinaja ( Third year student)As soon as I received the message that the OV chip card was going to be the only transport card that can be used for travelling for free, I hurried to the store in order to pick up my travel product before the deadline of 31 December 2009 (which eventually got postponed to March). At this point, I had my first problem concerning the OV chip card: the machine did not work properly at Albert Heijn. I had to wait for ten minutes (twice!) to find out that ‘picking up your travel product’ was not possible at that time. Secondly, in the beginning of January 2010 the chip card was not even valid in the Veolia buses in Tilburg! furthermore, this one time I had to buy a ticket for the train to Breda, but my train had already arrived. Therefore, I hurried towards the train and thought: “Well, I will use the OV chip card!” I knew that I had enough money on the card for the journey to Breda. The machine, however, refused to check me in. All of these examples make clear that I do not have positive experiences with the OV chip card. If you ask me, I prefer the old public transport card!

Hettie boonman (Master student)I think it is good that there is going to be a general card for buses, trams, and trains. In other countries, the system with similar cards seems to work quite well. However, I notice lots of troubles in the system in the Netherlands. Most important: the check-out posts. As there are no gates, you easily forget to check out. This can be very expensive for customers, since this costs them the maximum amount of twenty euros when travelling by train and four euros when travelling by bus. Besides, once you got out of the bus, you cannot check out anymore. Your bus is probably already gone and so is your money! In other countries, gates are used that only open if you hold your card against a scanner. In this way, you do not have to pay any additional fines! |

r A V E l l I N g W I t H o V C H I P C A r D S

O P I N I O N P O L L

Probably every student knows about the introduction of the oV chip card. Nekst detected some negative

remarks about the oV chip card lately. besides, Nekst also heard questions about the new chip card, as most

people do not know what to think about it. therefore, it is time for some answers. What do students think of the

new oV chip card and what are the main (dis)advantages of this card? Several students gave their opinion.


for this business interview, Nekst visited Maarten treur at Pharmerit bV in rotterdam. Upon entering

the building, in which Pharmerit is located, Maarten and his colleagues were just having lunch together.

fortunately, there was just enough space for two enthusiastic editors at the big lunch table, so Maarten

invited them to join.

Pharmerit is located on the seventh floor, which has a nice view on the skyline of Rotterdam. The large amount of glass used in the building makes it possible to almost always look outside, even when you walk through the corridor. There are about sixteen employees working for Pharmerit at this location. Pharmerit also has an office in York (United Kingdom) and in Washington (United States of America). With a total of thirty employees, Pharmerit is a relatively small company. It is also a young company. Pharmerit was founded in the Netherlands in 2000, the office in York was set up in 2006 and the US office started in 2005.

Personal informationAfter lunch, we went to a meeting room for the interview with Maarten Treur. first of all, we would like to know a bit more about Maarten himself. Why did he choose to study econometrics? Maarten: “I like mathematics and economics. Quite a common answer for people who study econometrics, is it not? Applied mathematics and statistics also appealed to me.” Maarten studied in Rotterdam, because the erasmus University offered the possibility to choose among four masters and had the largest department of econometrics at that time. He was also a member of the student association Gaudium and of the study association ‘Het econometrisch Dispuut’. Maarten: “Most people associate econometrics with mere theoretical knowledge, so I recommend econometricians to become an active member of an association. It also gives you the opportunity to improve your social skills. You learn how to organise meetings, convince people, cooperate and organise activities.”

At the end of his master’s programme, Maarten decided to combine his master’s thesis with an internship at Hunter Douglas. He optimised the production process of custom-made roller-blinds. Maarten’s thesis was not yet finished after his internship at Hunter Douglas, so he decided to

work part-time as a database analyst at the Renal Replacement Registry Netherlands (Renine, Dutch: Registratie NIerfunctievervanging Nederland). At that time, he already knew he wanted to become a consultant. A colleague at Renine advised him to consider working for Pharmerit, where he has worked for three years now.

PharmeritSo, what does Pharmerit do? Most people probably know that Pharmerit works in health economics. The consultants are specialised in health economics research, outcomes research and strategic market access research. Sounds very interesting, but what do all these nice terms mean?

Health economics research considers the health-related and economic implications of innovative health care interventions such as vaccination programmes, screening programmes, use of new medical devices or pharmacological treatments. The latter field is also known as pharmaco-economics which is Pharmerit’s main business. Drug makers commission Pharmerit to develop disease models that inform health authorities on the health related benefits and costs of new drugs. Based on this information, health authorities decide whether or not to reimburse new innovative medicines.

Outcomes research on the other hand, investigates the effect of healthcare interventions on relevant outcomes in humanistic, economic or clinical terms. It gives an answer to the question: what are the benefits to society? examples of this kind of research are quality of life questionnaires to elicit patient satisfaction, medical chart reviews and studies looking at the burden of disease of a specific indication in society.

Strategic market access research helps bringing new healthcare technologies to the international

l E x I b l E , D I V E r S E A N D M o r E

Name: Maarten Treur

Age:27

Position: Senior Research

Consultant

B U S I N e S S I N T e R V I e W P H A R M e R I T


market. It can support the development and commercialisation of new products, while keeping international, national and local regulations for healthcare products in mind. The sponsors of Pharmerit are mainly big pharmaceutical companies such as Bristol-Myers Squibb, Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline or Johnson & Johnson.

Working at PharmeritWorking at Pharmerit means working in a diverse environment. Maarten: “I work in a commercial and scientific environment. I can model, but I also do presentations for clients. I work at the computer, but I also visit clients or attend international conferences. I work at a company that combines econometrics and medicine, pharmacy and health sciences; I like this diversity.”

When you start working at Pharmerit, you will start as a junior research consultant. In the beginning, you will start working on a single project for one customer guided by a senior research consultant. While you are developing more skills,

you will get more responsibility. Once you become a senior research consultant, you are responsible for five to six projects simultaneously, you will do presentations on your own and you will guide junior consultants.

Career optionsPharmerit is a small company with a lot of opportunities in the continuously growing field of health-economics. There are many options to choose from. You may write scientific articles and it is even possible to write a dissertation at Pharmerit. Maarten already wrote a few papers. “I want to obtain my PhD degree in the next few years.”

Another possibility is to guide interns from the university who are at Pharmerit for their master’s thesis. Or you can choose to take upon other responsibilities within Pharmerit. Maarten: “It depends on what you want. Pharmerit organises courses at conferences in europe, Asia and the United States of America, so you can also become an instructor for these courses.”

Pharmerit is an international company, which offers you the opportunity to work abroad for a while. Maarten told us that he goes to foreign countries for a short period of time quite frequently. “You can also work at one of our offices in York or Washington for a longer period of time.”

Econometricians and Pharmeritfrom everything Maarten told, one will understand that Pharmerit is a young, flexible and diverse company. It can be an interesting place to work. Maarten: “You work with people from different backgrounds. You work with people from abroad, but you also work with pharmacists and people who studied biomedical sciences. You also learn to communicate your models to people with different backgrounds.”

Working as an econometrician at Pharmerit means that you can use econometric methods, while you also have to learn new methods. Maarten: “The advantage of econometricians is that their quantitative background enables them to quickly understand complex problems.” You are not finished learning after your master’s programme, Maarten explains. “econometrics is a good starting point for your future, but there is still a lot to learn.”

To conclude this interview, Maarten described the future of econometrics in healthcare. Maarten sees a future in applying more econometrics in healthcare, because it is still a relatively unexplored field. Maarten: “I think econometrics will become more and more important in health services. People are getting older and there will be less money available at the same time. This leads to more pressure on health-care budgets requiring the need for creative and quantitative solutions in which econometricians can play an important role.” |

Text by: Tess BeukersM a a r t e n b e h i n d h i s c o m p u t e r

Nekst 2 - December 2009 41

S t U D E N t A S S o C I A t I o N S

A N I N T R O D U c T I O N

When I started my studies two and a half years ago, I had already decided that I wanted to become a member of a student association. Mostly because I wanted to meet people from other study programmes and also because I wanted to live in a larger and more communal house. During the TIK-week, I concluded that T.S.c. St. Olof fitted me best, so I decided to become a member.

Looking back, I have never regretted my decision. Of course, the introduction week of Olof was not fun, but it was not too bad and all the stories I had heard in advance turned out to be untrue. I became a member of a society and got a room in the house of the society. I like hanging around, eating together, going out, etcetera. This year, I also got to know the more serious part of Olof, as I became a member of the Bookkeeping committee. We basically check and assist the treasurer of the association. My function is very nice and useful. To conclude, I really like my student life: especially Olof and my society contribute a lot to that.

T.S.R. Vidar is the only student association in Tilburg that is aimed at rowing. Vidar combines activities of standard student associations with a traditional student sport. This is what we call: the power of the combination. for me, this was – besides the great atmosphere – an important reason for joining Vidar. As a member of T.S.R Vidar, you can choose between rowing on a high level and keeping it easy by rowing as little as you like.

When I became a member of Vidar, I had never thought that I would like to row on a high level. After a few months, however, it became clear to me that I underestimated the beauty of rowing. After a very short period of time, rowing has become a major part of my life and I have never regretted my decision a single moment. This has already made my time within Vidar a great experience. On the other hand, a lot of people who do not like rowing at all have a great time within Vidar as well.

T.S.V. Plato was founded in 1987. Nowadays, this association is the largest student association in Tilburg with a total of almost 700 members. I became a member in my second year (2008). Since that time, I am very active within Plato: I joined several committees and I became a member of society equilibre.

The strength of Plato is the great diversity within the association. There are a lot of members and therefore everyone can identify himself with a certain society within the association. There are 21 of such societies and equilibre is one of the oldest. Last year, we celebrated our fourth lustrum with a week full of

activities, including a gala with dates and a lot of former members. I really enjoyed this week.

I recommend everyone to join a student association. Moreover, there are a lot of great parties and you make a lot of friends! If you want to know more about Plato, then just ask me!

T.S.V. D’Artagnan is the fourth musketeer and the fourth student association in Tilburg. The association has a building in the city centre of Tilburg, where activities take place almost every day. The activities are very diverse. On one evening we may be singing karaoke, whereas the next day we do a workshop of some kind. Debates, symposia, workshops, lectures, parties, and lounging: everyone has a place within d’Artagnan. Besides all the

evenings, a lot is taking place during the day as well. committees have meetings and people come by to study or watch some television. In the summer, you can also sit on the terrace of d’Artagnan and drink a nice cold beer or a cocktail.

It even gets better! every year, d’Artagnan organises a trip to a country that you would usually not visit. In the past years, we went to places like cuba, Morocco and Russia. We will visit India this year.

Students have always been looking for the best way to make life as a student as exciting as possible. this resulted in

the foundation of many student associations in cities all over the Netherlands. there are a lot of student associations in

tilburg as well. Nekst was interested to hear the stories of fellow econometricians about their student association.


Pieter Platteel

T . S . C . S t . O l o f

Tom van der Vorst

T . S . V . P l a t o

Gijs IJsebaert

T . S . R . V i d a r

Paul Deckers

T . S . V . D ’ A r t a g n a n

Health EconomicsGlobally, healthcare system are confronted with increasing pressure on health care budgetsdue to ageing populations and growing expenditures. In this challenging field, decisionsneed to be made about the optimal allocation of available and novel health-careinterventions. This is the field of health economics where disciplines such as medicine,pharmacology, statistics and econometrics come together. In health economic analyses thebalance between health improvements and costs of new interventions, such as medicinesis assessed.PharmeritCommissioned by big pharmaceutical companies, Pharmerit develops disease models toassess the health-related benefits and costs of new medicines. Based on this information,local health care authorities make decisions about reimbursement of these medicines.Within Pharmerit, econometricians and pharmacologists work closely together buildingthese disease models. In this semi-academic field, academic as well as commercial skills areindispensible. Pharmerit is active in many different countries with offices in Rotterdam,York andWashington.Job opportunitiesPharmerit is always looking for highly skilled, quantitatively schooled and motivated newpeople. If you are interested in applying your quantitative skills in the growing, challengingand international environment of health-economics, Pharmerit my be interested in you.Visit our website for further information or contact Bart Heeg, [email protected], .+31(0) 10 451 9924.


At the start of the workshop, we got a brief introduction to NedTrain and I learned that NedTrain is responsible for the cleaning and maintenance of Dutch trains. As there are many trains, it is important that there are enough spare parts available for repairs without building up large expensive inventories. furthermore, trains are quite expensive, so decreasing the fraction of trains that cannot be used due to maintenance will lead to significant savings as well. Although NedTrain is over 150 years old, the company is still trying to become more efficient. As the company is already leading the international quality ranking for train maintenance companies, it now wants to take the lead in the cost rankings as well.

Given an outline of the status quo, we had to find improvements for the continuous maintenance cycle for trains. The main objective was to find sufficient improvements in order to decrease the standard length of a maintenance session from 48 hours to only 8 hours. The main advantage of this change is the fact that trains can be repaired during overnight sessions and are thus available during rush hours. The symposium was organised by Asset | econometrics and Asset | TOP-DOWN, so people with different backgrounds worked together in groups to solve the problem. It was fun to see the resulting large diversity in suggested solutions. Not surprisingly, however, the winning team mainly consisted of econometricians. After the prizes were presented, there was a short break followed by a presentation by Prof. Dr Hagdorn. She introduced a new topic that is quite important in practice, but often forgotten in lectures. This topic was none other than the matter of trust! Game theory dictates that cooperative gains are higher than gains that are achieved by summing up the efforts of individuals. This makes perfect sense. In practice,

however, convincing companies to cooperate with their competitors turns out to be quite hard. As 4c is all about cooperation among companies, it is crucial to find ways to make companies trust each other. Prof. Dr Hagdorn showed that operating as an independent third party ultimately led to cooperation among companies in the area of Maasvlakte. With trains that are rarely operating below full capacity, it is possible to expand the area with Maasvlakte 2. After this presentation, the other speakers of the day joined Prof. Dr Hagdorn to discuss several topics and answer all questions the audience had regarding the 4c concept. As people were not shy to ask questions, there was not enough time to answer all of them. fortunately, everyone had the opportunity to talk to the speakers in person during the drink, which took place in the foyer right after the discussion.

In the evening, there was another activity of Asset | econometrics: the Après Ski Drink! As not only econometricians, but also strategy and logistics students were invited, there were quite a lot of people downing ‘flugels’ at café Babbus. Of course, the traditional beer steins and lederhosen completed the good atmosphere! |

Name: Dennis Jaheruddin

Age:21

begin studies:2007

As Joep already mentioned, there was a parallel session after the break. Whilst Joep was enrolled in the

workshop offered by INg, I went to the workshop offered by Nedtrain. I had heard of this name before and I

was quite curious for two reasons. first of all, I was not exactly sure what Nedtrain does with trains. Secondly,

I wondered how their activities would be related to operations research.

P a n e l d i s c u s s i o n


on tuesday 2 March, my alarm went off early as it often does. While I was trying to keep my eyes open, I collected

my jacket, blouse, and trousers, which formed my formal clothing for the day. thereafter, I headed for the bathroom

to brush my teeth. As soon as I was fully awake, I made myself a breakfast and a lunch, of which I already knew

that it was going to end up in the recycle bin because of the great lunch that would be served at the symposium.

When I was sure that I did not forget anything – and this also included the socks of a friend of mine – it was time to head for Tilburg! coincidentally (or maybe not), I came by a nice article about logistics in one of the news papers in the train. It certainly set the tune for the day.

In the morning, I first had to follow some lectures including Differentiation and Integration Theory and the introductory meeting of Modelling in Practice. It seemed to be an ordinary Tuesday morning, except that many people were dressed up very nicely and I noticed that many people had paid a lot of attention to their haircuts, shoes, etcetera. After a long, long morning of staring at the clock and watching it approaching half past twelve very slowly, it was finally time for the main activity of the day: the Logistics Symposium. Theme of the day was: cross chain control centre. At the reception desk, we were welcomed by the committee, some volunteers, and a terrific lunch. The choice between the different sandwiches was so difficult that I eventually took two… mi scuzi!

After a few minutes, Thomas Geelen suddenly shouted that we had to hurry up and move to the auditorium, where we were welcomed by him as the chairman of the Symposium committee. At first, Thomas was a bit nervous, but soon he started to become the person we know again. Thomas, you did a great job! After Thomas, the floor was for Prof. Dr Kant. He held an introductory talk about the theme of the day. He used a nice example to make everybody familiar with the subject: companies transporting cow feed should cooperate in order to distribute the feed as efficiently as possible.

After this presentation, Prof. Dr Van der Velde had the task to make us more familiar with the subject, but as he explained us, it would be very difficult to get us totally familiar with the subject as very few people can explain what 4c

(cross chain control centre) actually means. Whether he made us familiar with the subject or not, his lecture was great. He really made me listen and he tried very hard to explain 4c in great detail. Moreover, he told us about the ambitions of Dinalog, the institution that tries to set up and explore the possibilities of such a control centre in logistics. Mark my words: this institution is ambitious, which is a good thing. To put it in perspective, seven percent of Dutch GDP is earned in the field of logistics, whereas only one percent of the Dutch citizens are employed in logistics. It is clear that this business offers great opportunities.

As soon as Prof. Dr Van der Velde was finished, Mr Van der Meij took the microphone. He is director of the delivery company DHL exel, president of some committees in logistics, and he is also an Officer in the Order of Orange-Nassau since 2005. He studied Transportation Studies and believes that people in logistics should certainly be in the board room of any big company. At the end of the presentation of Mr Van der Meij, some of us were in need of a break, which fortunately was scheduled next.

After the break, we all had to find our guides, who led us to the Dante Building, where the workshops would take place. I was enrolled in the workshop offered by ING. I liked the workshop, although it was a bit disappointing that it was actually more like an interactive lecture than a workshop. The workshop dealt with the issue of Supply chain finance (Scf). The main idea behind this is that you can squeeze cash from a company by collecting money from your debtors as soon as possible and postpone payments to your creditors as long as possible. The bank plays a key role in this concept, because it more or less pays money to firms that still have debtors owing them this money. In this way, the working capital of that firm is enlarged.

C : C o N V I N C I N g C o M P A N I E S t o

C o o P E r A t E W I t H C o M P E t I t o r S

Name: Joep Hendriks

Age:19

begin studies: 2008

L O G I S T I c S S Y M P O S I U M A N D A P R è S S K I D R I N K


to miss the experience. During the introduction week, there were some information sessions in which we learned about the courses, the class schedules, the exams, the computers and all other important Danish rules. We even got an instruction on how to ride a bike: when going left, do not cross at once, but cross the road twice straight. I actually witnessed a lot of accidents, especially because no one was used to pedal breaks.

In the evening, there were again several social activities on the programme, which actually meant that we ended up partying in the most famous clubs of copenhagen. It was a unique experience, since we would normally be unable to afford going to those clubs. Next to a high entrance fee, a beer would cost you at least seven euros. Although I was already quite used to the high prices

in copenhagen, these prices were still way too high for a poor student. The final party of the introduction week was even more special: a formal dinner with a band playing afterwards. Besides, everyone was expected to dress up in a suit or a gala dress. In my opinion, it was a great closure of the week.

A closure of the introduction week means a start of the classes. Yes, I did do some studying too, although it was not that much. compared to the first two weeks, the start of the semester did not run very smoothly as the organisation was terrible. classes were given at different times in different rooms every week and therefore they would always conflict at some point. furthermore, they assigned me to four courses that were all taught in the second quarter, which did not start until October. Therefore,

I had to change all my courses, even though many classes were already full. Therefore, I ended up with four random courses that were hardly related to econometrics: Sports economics, financial Management, Descriptive Tourism and cultural economics and Logistics and Transportation economics. Nevertheless, the courses were interesting. In Sports economics, we learned everything about european football leagues and the famous Northern American leagues. In Descriptive Tourism and Logistics, we talked mainly about travelling. While the content was quite amusing, the level of difficulty was incredibly low. Therefore, I passed all my exams without too much effort.

Despite I did not learn a lot in class, I did learn many other things in Denmark. first of all, it is very nice to experience the differences in

T h e f a m o u s c o l o u r e d h o u s e s o f N y h a v n


the country of bicycles, licorice, windmills, and rain, where people are very straightforward and drink a lot

of alcohol. that is how the exchange coordinator described the host country to the new exchange students

during his welcome speech. No, I have not been on exchange to Holland. I went to Denmark and it was

definitely a semester completely different from the regular semesters in Holland.

I departed on Saturday 18 August and it did not really feel like I was leaving for half a year. At that moment, you do not realise it. The flight was just an hour, so I did not have the time to think about it. I did not even have the time to feel lonely as my buddy was waiting for me at the airport to pick me up and escort me to my residence. My residence was huge, with twenty people on each of the five floors. I had my own kitchen and I had to share the bathroom with only one other girl. The location was great, since all university buildings were close by. One of them was actually connected to my residence, so for some classes I did not even have to put on shoes (figuratively spoken). I arrived a bit early, so there was no one else yet. fortunately, my buddy stayed for a while and she showed me around the city. The next days, more and more people arrived and soon I met all other 99 house mates.

On Monday, I had to go to my first lesson Danish, because I signed up for a Danish crash course. During a week I had a class of three hours with about twelve other people every day. The classes were very interactive. We learned how to greet, to count, to enumerate the days of the week, to tell the time, and to ask for directions. We did not learn grammar, but only some frequently used sentences and words. The classes were mainly focused on pronunciation and soon we realised that there was no logic behind it at all. Danish writing looks quite similar to Dutch writing, so reading was hardly a problem. Speaking, in contrast, was very difficult. Words are not pronounced as they are written and some sounds are not even pronounced at all. Luckily, this was not that big of a problem as everyone in Denmark speaks english fluently. even when you were trying to talk in Danish, people automatically switched to english. Therefore, I only used

the words ‘tak’ (thanks) and ‘undskyld’ (sorry).

The weather was still very pleasant, so every time after class we went outside to lie down in the park or we went downtown to discover copenhagen. every evening, there were some social activities organised. The first day, there was a Danish ‘Hygge’, which means something like cosiness. We got Danish food (licorice, chocolate milk and a special kind of hotdog, which was extremely Danish) and a play was performed to show the Danish culture and habits. We also did a quiz to test our Danish knowledge. The other evening activities were speed dating, folk dancing and a city boat tour. Afterwards, we went out to discover the bars. I think this was one of the best weeks during my exchange.

The next week was amazing as well: the introduction week. Another 400 people, who did not participate in the Danish crash course, arrived. Now the number of exchange students had increased to a total of 700 students! They probably figured out before that Danish is not the most useful language to learn, although I would never have wanted

A N I S H H Y g g E A N D b E l g I A N

S t o E M P

Name: Tessa Bakkers

Age:22

begin studies: 2006

e x c H A N G e R e P O R T

T h e l i t t l e m e r m a i d


teaching of the courses. Teachers expect students to participate actively. They ask more questions and Danish students love giving answers. There is a lot more discussion in class. In addition, we had to work on more presentations, papers and projects than in the Netherlands. Many exams were written on a computer, which I found very convenient in case you had to write a lot.

I also heard many stories from other exchange students about their classes and how they live as a student, and I noticed that they are way more motivated and performance-driven than Dutch students. Grades and internships seem to be a lot more important in other countries and there is less opportunity for resits. I also learned many habits, traditions and behaviours from all the other exchange students, which is of course one of the great experiences of an exchange. However, I think that one of the most important things I have achieved during my exchange is that I have improved my english considerably. I thought I could not speak it very well until I arrived in copenhagen. I noticed that Dutch and Scandinavian people are actually very good compared to people from the more southern countries. I even got a higher grade for an oral exam than my Brittan friends. I had many native english speaking friends and they were very helpful if I had any difficulty in finding the right words.

When I was not in class, I spent lots of time in my residence. There was a big common room where people were talking or playing games almost every evening. We organised several activities as well. We even had a couple of international dinners, during which everyone had to make a traditional dish from their country. I found out that the Dutch ‘hutspot’ and Belgian ‘stoemp’ are exactly the

same. Besides, I was very surprised to notice that everyone liked the dish that much.

There were many house parties, especially in the summer, and all birthdays were celebrated outrageous. furthermore, we went out very often. copenhagen is a very lively city and there are hundreds of bars and clubs. for that reason, something was always going on. The exchange crew organised many parties as well. There was a kick-off party, a Halloween party, a christmas party, a goodbye party etcetera. Moreover, this crew organised several trips. for example, we went with 450 students to Oslo with a huge cruise ship. That was quite an experience! In addition, I went to Prague for a couple of days with two canadian girls, a finnish and an American girl and I went to Sweden for one day, which was just half an hour crossing the bridge. Many friends came to visit me and I travelled around

Denmark via some smaller towns with my parents. As a result, there was no time to get bored.

I have been back for a couple of weeks now and it seems ages ago that I have been there. It feels weird to write this, because I realise that it will never be the same again. It sounds very dramatic, but it is true. There will be some people that I will never see again. However, I am still talking to many others and plans are already made for a big reunion. Some people stayed in copenhagen for a full year and it is strange to read that they are still doing the same things, but with different people. It is good to know that they miss us a bit as well. I have learned a lot, I have met many people and I did many things that I would or could never have done in the Netherlands. Therefore, I would like to say to you that you should definitely go on exchange. It is an unforgettable and great experience! |

T e s s a w i t h f r i e n d s


There is not enough clarity about who the ‘owner’ of the costs isIn practice, mainly the cfO and/or ceO are concerned with cost optimisation. In order to have a truly sustainable chance of success, cost optimisation must however be anchored in the entire company. A cost-aware culture of that nature begins with clear responsibilities.

Cost drivers are not clearMany organisations do not have any insight into the ways in which their most important costs are generated. Only half of the companies investigated know exactly how costs and profit generating activities are influenced. The connection between activities and costs is usually not clear, meaning that making choices with regard to those activities is hardly possible.

furthermore, research shows that considerable nerve is required for structural cost reduction. Many managers still prefer to use slicing the budget as cost-cutting method and go for quick wins. This causes at best a temporary effect, because just like with many fad diets, the kilos come back within no time. A company that wants to optimise costs over the long term must have the daring to carry through a fundamental approach by diving into the entire business model, carrying out changes in the entire organisation, and involving the entire management team in such changes.

the pitfall of shrinking costs2

In the ‘80s, countless factories were closed in branches that were at the end of their life cycle. Since then, unabated attention has been paid to cost reduction, also within the framework of post-merger integrations. cost reduction has therefore been generally accepted in a world in which companies are constantly making adjustments in order to maintain their competitive strength. There is a risk of falling into the trap of: ‘downsizing, rightsizing, dumbsizing,

capsizing’. Research has already been done into the effectiveness of cost reductions for a number of decades. One of the most extensive and systematic investigations was carried out in the ‘80s by cameron, freeman and Mishra3. Their investigation, which took four years to complete, led to the conclusion that a negative correlation existed between the efficiency of an organisation and shrinking costs through layoffs. Although much has changed since then, it is still important to remain aware of the related psychological effects. This involves the following issues:

• The psychological agreement in which an unspoken lifelong career is promised in exchange for hard work and loyalty no longer applies. In its place, a company must provide meaning to the term employability.

• Attention should be paid to the stress reaction of remaining employees. The threat exists that they could lose their jobs in the future, while having to work harder in the meantime by picking up the work left by their laid-off colleagues. for the management, the challenge is to provide active leadership to the cost shrinking process.

• Attention should be paid to the strain on managers who have to lay off employees. A loss of reliability and distancing from the shop floor lie await them. This also places further pressure on the employees who remain.

Personal misfortune is usually unavoidable. Moreover, reducing costs does not automatically lead to success in the future. In essence, a company that is well prepared for the reactions of those involved minimises the risk of failure.

In conclusionNow that the economy has survived a period of inclement weather, cost reduction will only continue to rise

in importance on the agenda of management. In practice, however, many initiatives seem to lead to disappointment and the cost cutting method does not offer any long-lasting effect. KPMG research, practical experience, and the literature concerning the psychological effects of cost reduction provide valuable lessons. These lessons can be summarised into three aspects:

Leadership and communication• A clear, shared vision of the necessity and direction for change• Strong leadership• Transparent external and internal communication

Excellent implementation• A good understanding of the business and its underlying drivers• clear accountability for targets• An integrated approach with a balanced project portfolio• central coordination and control concerning content and financial results• focus on realisation

Changing behaviour• Sound HR tools to manage personal outcomes• changing and securing new working methods• Paying attention to the psychological aspects of cost reduction |

references

1. KPMG, Rethinking cost Structures: creating sustainable

cost advantage, 2008

2. Based on Kets de Vries, ‘Worstelen met de Demon: over

emoties, irrationaliteit en onbewuste processen in mens en

organisatie’, [Wrestling with the Devil: emotions, irrationality

and unintentional processes in people and organisations],

2000

3. cameron, freeman, Mishra, Best Practices in White

collar Downsizing: Managing contradictions, Academy of

Management executive 5/3, 1991

* This article is based on ‘excellent presteren - Visie op betere

bedrijfsvoering’ by Maarten van Hest, ernst Keyzer and

William Koot, KPMG Advisory N.V.


Cost optimisation is an age-old topic, but remains a high priority in times of economic struggle. A company that

cannot compete simply does not survive. However, research and practical experience show that companies

often become mired in cost cutting, providing no lasting effect. In order to achieve real results, it is necessary

to perform a fundamental analysis and to carry out measures based on that analysis.

Slicing the budget provides no long-lasting comfort • 59 percent of companies seem to be capable to truly reduce costs, while only 8 percent completely realise their intended cost optimisation.• Particularly in times of economic crisis, it is necessary to increase the efficiency of cost reduction programmes.• Shrinking costs does not automatically lead to success in the future; it is also important to be well prepared for the psychological aspects.

Cost optimisation is an age-old topicThe necessity of effectively managing a company’s cost level manifests itself not only in lean years. even in years of economic growth, attention should be paid to achieving better control of the relationship between expenses and income. The pressure to be in tip-top shape – as a result of transparency with regard to performance and pressure stemming from private equity parties, etcetera – is high in such times as well. A company that is not prosperous enough soon becomes a target for takeover. Private equity parties maintain cost reduction programmes themselves as a permanent part of their corporate strategy.

changing competitive relationships are also a stimulus for cost optimisation. That was evident several years ago in the Dutch supermarket sector, among others. for years, Albert Heijn was seen as a grocer with a good eye for service, but less of an eye for price. competitors such as Aldi were given the opportunity to seize an apparently unhindered share of the market by paying close attention to prices and expenses. When the megagrocer from Zaandam did react and engaged in price competition, a supermarket war erupted. All at once, cost optimisation was at the centre of everyone’s agenda. Suppliers such as Unilever were forced to contribute by adjusting their prices.

Particularly in times of economic crisis, it is necessary to increase the efficiency of cost reduction programmes. The reality, however, is that such plans do not always lead to the desired results. Moreover, the KPMG report ‘Rethinking cost Structures: creating sustainable cost advantage’ shows on the basis of international research that companies often achieve the opposite of what they want, principally due to unnecessary prudence with respect to their cost strategy.

KPMg research1: not all opportunities are being utilisedMost managers agree that an efficient cost structure is a source of competitive advantage. In our research, four out of five participants emphasise the importance of an efficient cost structure, although only 59 percent of companies are successful in truly reducing costs. A small minority of eight percent is able to realise its intended targets completely. The vast majority of approximately ninety percent, therefore, does not. The most important reasons for this are:

Plans are too cautiousMany companies do not seem to be very ambitious when defining their cost reduction initiatives and allow themselves to be (mis)guided by practical obstacles and political considerations. Only if external pressure becomes very high, greater aspirations appear attainable.

Turnover growth erodes cost efficiencyforty-two percent of respondents acknowledge that turnover growth reduces their competitive edge regarding cost level. In theory, it is in times of growth in particular that it is simple to realise cost efficiency. In reality, however, the situation is more tenacious: times of growth are often synonymous with poorer efficiency ratios.

o S t o P t I M I S A t I o N

Name: Ernst Keyzer

Position:Advisor at KPMG

Performance &

Technology

S c I e N T I f I c A R T I c L e K P M G

au d i t ta x a dv i s o ry

ga naar www.gaaan.nu

-03871_A4_intro_adv_OF.indd 1 13-10-2009 10:09:14

Nekst 3 - March 2010 �1

l U S t r U M f o r A l U M N I

A S S o C I A t I o NV A e T A c T I V I T Y

What is VAEt?As mentioned in the introduction, VAeT is the alumni association for former students of the econometrics programme in Ti lburg. The association was founded over for ty years ago and its main goal is to intensify the relationships between former econometrics students and between former students and members of the depar tment of econometrics and Operations Research. In order to achieve this, VAeT organises a yearly alumni event for which al l former students and al l current and former staff members of the depar tment are invited. The primar y goal of the alumni event is offer ing par t icipants the chance to meet former classmates and fr iends and to maintain their network. In addit ion, the VAeT day is a per fect platform for digging into the recent developments in the area of econometrics. Membership is free (no yearly membership fee required) and former students can apply for membership after successful completion of the bachelor ’s or master ’s programme in the f ield of econometrics and Operations Research.

VAEt Ac tivityThe most recent VAeT day was held on Tuesday 10 November 2009. Due to the fact that VAeT was celebrating its 40th anniversar y last year, a special programme was organised. Jean fr i jns and Wim van den Goorbergh, two renowned former students of the depar tment holding senior management posit ions in different companies in the f inancial area, held fascinating lectures on stabi l i ty and trust in the f inancial world. The day was chaired by Piet Verheyen, who is a founder and honourable member of VAeT. After the two interesting lectures, there was also t ime to strengthen the relationships

between former classmates and (former) staff members of the depar tment. In l ine with tradit ion, the day was concluded with a dr ink at Ti lbur y ’s and a dinner in a restaurant near Ti lburg University. The day was vis ited by over eighty people and was well appreciated considering the many posit ive feedbacks we received.

VAEt and studentsThe board of VAeT offers al l students in the f inal phase of the master ’s programme the oppor tunity to get to k now VAeT by invit ing them to the VAeT day on a regular basis. As a result , we were ver y pleased to see that some students grasped this oppor tunity and joined the most recent VAeT day. Of course, we were also del ighted to have two board members of Asset | econometrics at the event. We hope to welcome even more students during the next VAeT event, which wil l take place at the end of this year. |

Name: Dirk Ungerechts

Position:Chairman VAET

right now, you are reading a magazine that is meant primarily for students. Due to this fact, most readers will

probably not have heard about VAEt. VAEt is the abbreviation for the alumni association for econometricians in

tilburg (Dutch: Vereniging van Afgestudeerde Econometristen tilburg). As most students would like to become

alumni at some point in time, it makes sense to give a proper introduction to this alumni association.

W i m v a n d e n G o o r b e r g h


Right now, they are working on a medley composed of music from the Star Trek movies and series. Lindsay put this idea for ward through the Hyves website of the orchestra. They work for about two to three months on one piece. The music from Star Trek will be played on the open door day. According to Lindsay, it is a beautiful piece, even though they sti l l need to practise a lot.

A special per formance took place on 13 December 2009. Kempisch Symphony Orchestra Veldhoven and the orchestra of Lindsay ’s school of music gave a per formance together. The combined orchestra played the music of ‘ The Snowman’ l ive, while the movie was playing on a big screen behind them. Besides the combined orchestra that consisted of ninety people in total, there was also a children’s choir consisting of forty-five children, which sang some parts. Although the movie had a total length of thir ty minutes, not everyone had to play every part, so

there were some short breaks to let your hands rest.

Suppor tLindsay ’s mother always wanted to play an instrument, but she never got the chance. for this reason, she has always supported and encouraged Lindsay. She is probably Lindsay ’s biggest fan, although she has some competition from Lindsay ’s boyfriend and her father. Lindsay : “My father is not a great musician himself : he even whistles false!”

When Lindsay started playing the violin, she hired a violin from her school of music. After some time, however, she felt ready for having a violin of her own. She went to a violin maker in eindhoven with Nico to make sure that she would buy a good one. for the best sound, it is essential that the right k ind of wood and varnish are used. furthermore, the violin has to be built extremely precisely. I t was a huge investment and Lindsay is very thankful to her

parents for this wonder ful bir thday present. She has got her violin for f ive years now and – except for some broken strings – nothing happened to it .

Next to playing the violin herself, Lindsay l ikes l istening to other musicians as well . She sometimes visits concerts or l istens to a cD. At the moment, her favourite violinists are Janine Jansen and Hil lary Hahn. André Rieu is not one of her favourites, although she admires him. Not because of the music he plays, but because of his enthusiasm and precision. A violinist, who she would really l ike to meet, is the great Paganini, even though he already passed away over a hundred years ago. She would l ike to ask him how he wrote all those diff icult music pieces, l ike caprice 24.

Lindsay notes that it is sometimes hard to combine her passion and her studies, especially since she has recently moved to Tilburg. As a consequence, she has to bring her violin with her every time she goes from Veldhoven to Tilburg. Lindsay tells that she is wil l ing to do that, because the orchestra is such a staunch group and she sti l l l ikes the music they play. furthermore, they have a very good conductor. In the end, however, she thinks that studying should definitely come in first place. Lindsay : “I think of myself as a violin playing nerd.” As you might have guessed, she does not want music to be her whole l ife, although she would l ike to continue playing in the orchestra at least until she is sixty years old. furthermore, she would also l ike to learn how to play the cello and the piano. Without a doubt, music wil l remain her passion for a long time. |

Text by : Nienke VugtsL i n d s a y p r a c t i s i n g w i t h t h e g i r l s o f C o l L e g n o

�2 Nekst 3 - March 2010

As a child, lindsay asked for a flute. In no-time she was done with it and wanted something else. the next

instrument she learned playing was not as conventional as a flute: she took accordion lessons. for twelve

years now, she can play the accordion. In transitional class, however, she again longed for a new challenge

and back then her passion for the violin was born.

Lindsay tells you need fine movements to be a good violinist. A flexible wrist, arm, shoulder, and flexible f ingers are required as well . Therefore – as with most things – it is a good idea to start at a young age. Although Lindsay did not start playing the violin a long time ago, she is already leading the orchestra of her local school of music, which has a violin section consisting of thir ty to forty violinists. Besides, she sometimes plays some minor solos during concerts. Lindsay says that she is not ready yet for a big solo, since she is sti l l learning a lot.

Besides playing in the orchestra, Lindsay is also a member of a string quartet, called col Legno. col Legno is a term that describes a special way of playing the violin. Instead of playing with the hairs of the bow, you play with the wooden side. This gives a k ind of spooky effect. At f irst, Lindsay found it hard to fit in the group, because the other gir ls had a different way of playing. I t took her about a month before she felt comfortable enough to play louder and make mistakes.

from practice to per formance To become a good violinist in a short period of time, Lindsay practises a lot. She practises at home about four times a week. She starts with tuning her violin. Thereafter, she plays some etudes, which are technical music pieces with fast str ing changes. Lindsay : “I t is a bit boring to play, but an etude is a good exercise.”

After playing several etudes, she rehearses some pieces for the orchestra or quartet. When she has played for about one and a half hours, her arm gets tired and she has to stop. She does not know whether there exists something similar to a tennis elbow,

l ike a violin arm, but fortunately she has not had any inconveniences from that so far.

Lindsay gets personal violin lessons from Nico Dezaire, who is also the conductor of the orchestra and the supervisor of the quartet. Those lessons are very important to Lindsay, because Nico gives her a lot of useful instructions. She has learned a lot in a short period of time, but sti l l lacks a lot of experience. However, she does not want to accept the fact that she cannot succeed in everything.

Lindsay practises one and a half hour with the orchestra every week and per forms at the local school of music once in a while. There is a concert every christmas and on the open door day in March they per form as well . Besides that, the parents’ council , Nico, and his wife sometimes arrange trips. for instance, there was a tr ip to Austria, where orchestras from all over europe gathered to play together. Unfortunately, Lindsay could not join the tr ip, because of her exams. In 2007, the orchestra had an exchange with the orchestra from Jarocin, Poland, because of the 800th anniversary of the sister commune of Veldhoven, where Lindsay ’s school of music is situated. Marc van Platen, a Dutch composer, wrote a music piece for this occasion. I t was a very modern piece about k ids playing with the radio. Lindsay admits that she did not really l ike it .

The orchestra usually plays f i lm music and some classical music. In Poland, for example, they played a 007 medley and a classical piece with a lot of runs, which caused Lindsay to get tired fingers. I t was a bit of a tragedy for her, because her music sheets were in the wrong order as well .

V I o l I N P l AY I N g N E r D

Name: Lindsay Overkamp

Age:20

begin studies: 2008

T H e P A S S I O N O f L I N D S A Y O V e R K A M P

Nekst 3 - March 2010 ��

A N I C E W A r M - U P f o r C A r N A V A l

c A R N A V A L V O L L e Y B A L L T O U R N A M e N T A N D A S S e T P A R T Y

The activity started in the Astrics room at 17:00 hours, where all participants met to have dinner together. Unfortunately, we had a lecture until 16:30 hours, so we were unable to join for dinner as we had to dress up as well. The theme for participants of Asset | econometrics was Beauty and the Nerd. It turned out that almost everyone felt more familiar with the nerd type! Why should we not, since we are still econometricians? Some of us wrote difficult equations on their shirts, others were wearing nerdy glasses and white socks. However, there was also a Miss Universe in our team!

The volleyball tournament began at 19:00 hours. Asset | econometrics took part with two teams: Voulez-vous Jouer? and Astrics’ Blue. On the registration form for this day, we had to indicate whether we were experienced in volleyball or not. The semi-experienced players formed Voulez-vous Jouer? and the inexperienced players formed Astrics’ Blue. each team was placed in a pool with teams of the same level of experience in order to give both experienced and inexperienced participants the opportunity to play some nice games.

When we arrived at the sports centre – about half an hour late – we heard from our fellow team members of Astrics’ Blue that we already won our first match without being present, because our first opponent had not shown up at all and luckily enough some of our team members had. At that time, our colleagues of Voulez-vous Jouer? were playing their first match and even won!

After a first round of beer, it was our turn again. Our first real match ended in a painful defeat, although nobody seemed to care about that at all. The next two hours, we played two more games (one win, one loss), supported the other team, and drank some beers.

As soon as the tournament was finished, we moved to the sports canteen, where the party had already started. However, after having danced to the ‘Tsjoe tsjoe wa’ song and having walked the polonaise for the first time that evening, some of us began to ache for a game of volleyball again and returned to the sports hall to play another match. The others became enthusiastic as well, so in the end almost all econometricians could be found in the sports hall.

At about twelve o’clock it was time for us to bike to café Bolle, where the pre-carnaval party was taking place. Upon arrival at café Bolle, it was so crowded that we had great difficulties reaching the other side of the pub, where we had to hand in our coats. Yet it was a great party with many of the well-known aspects of carnaval: we met some living bananas, walked the polonaise several times and sang along with this year’s carnaval songs (something about a ‘soft g’ this time). After a few more hours of partying, our legs began to feel weak and it was time to go home. Of course, we first ate a Jantje Sandwich (Dutch: Broodje Jantje) before going to bed. I look back with satisfaction: it was a nice activity and I was perfectly warmed up for five more days of carnaval! |

Name: Maarten Meeuwis

Age:18

begin studies:2009

on thursday 11 february, just before carnaval, two activities were organised by the students in tilburg: a

carnaval volleyball tournament in the sports centre and a pre-carnaval party in Café bolle. of course, some

members of Asset | Econometrics joined to show their volleyball skills and to taste a little bit of the carnaval

atmosphere in advance.

T h e b e a u t i e s a n d t h e n e r d s


H A t M A K E S Y o U H A P P Y ?

c O L U M N

Happiness is a popular research topic in economics and many economists, including some colleagues in my department, examine the determinants of happiness. Some results of this research have been summarised in a book by the British economist Richard Layard. 1

How do economists measure happiness? They tend to ask people questions like: “Taking all things together, would you say that you are very happy, quite happy, or not very happy?” Are the answers to these questions meaningful and can they be compared across people? Richard Layard claims that these answers are meaningful. If we ask friends or colleagues about a person’s happiness, their answers tend to agree with the person’s own assessment. This even holds for the assessment of an interviewer who has never met this person before. Answers about happiness are similar if people are asked the same questions in different languages. Such answers also seem to be related with electrical activity in the relevant parts of a person’s brain.

So what makes people happy? Happiness can fluctuate with the activities people are involved in. People tend to be most happy while having sex and they tend to be least happy while they are commuting or working. During social interactions, people tend to be most happy when they are talking with friends and least happy when they are talking with their boss. If we compare happiness across countries, then the Dutch are the happiest people in the world. 2

economists tend to be especially interested in the relationship between happiness and income. In their utility maximising framework, they tend to assume that utility increases with income. furthermore, it is interesting to see if this also applies to happiness. Not surprisingly, richer people tend to be happier. However, if we compare average happiness across countries on the basis of GDP per capita, we find that this relationship is nonlinear. Happiness increases strongly with income up to a GDP per capita of about $10,000 and increases very slowly or not at all for higher income levels. If we compare happiness over time for rich countries,

such as the United States of America or the United Kingdom, we find that happiness has not increased at all during the last fifty years. This seems surprising, given that real incomes have doubled during this period, life expectancy has increased substantially, and that people did not have flat screen TVs and iPods fifty years ago.

There are several explanations for the fact that people in rich countries are not getting happier. One explanation is that after the satisfaction of basic necessities such as food, clothing, and shelter, happiness does not increase with average income. People might still care about their relative income position and they receive happiness out of getting higher incomes than their comparison group, but the number of people with above median income stays constant over time. If people derive happiness exclusively from their relative social position, then average happiness does not increase with average income. This way of reasoning is of course very different from standard economic theory.

Another explanation is that higher incomes have made people happier, but that there were also other negative factors wiping out the gains in happiness. Humans are social beings and happiness tends to be strongly related to social cohesion. Average happiness across countries varies with factors such as the ratio of people who say that other people can be trusted, the proportion of people belonging to social organisations, the divorce rate, the unemployment rate, the quality of government, and religious beliefs. Social coherence has declined in many Western countries in the past decades and this could have offset the gains in happiness from higher income.

How can you find an answer to the raised question? You could ask you priest or your parents about it. However, you could always read some articles in economic journals as well. |

1. Happiness – lessons from a new science, Penguin Press, New York, 2005

2. This can be seen on a graph on p. 32 of the Layard book.

Name: Martin Salm

Position:Assistant Professor

What makes you happy? Most people have thought about this question at some point in their life. Classical greek

philosophers, medieval theologians, and modern self-help gurus have written many books on the question of how

to live a happy life. When people seek advice on this question, they tend to turn to priests or psychotherapists, to

their parents, or to barkeepers. few people seek advice from economists. this might be a mistake.


the componentwise maxima: the f irst element of that vector is the maximum of al l f i rst elements, the second element is the maximum of al l second elements over n vectors, and so on. We general ise the univar iate max-domain of attraction condit ion in the fol lowing way.

Definition 2.1Let X

1, . . . ,X

n b e a random sample

from a continuous d-variate distr ibution func tion F, X

i = (X

i1, . . .

,Xid

), i = 1, . . . , n. I f there exist p osit ive sequences denoted by (a

n,1) , . . . , (a

n,d)

and sequences (bn,1

) , . . . , (bn,d

) of real numb ers such that

as n → ∞, for ever y continuit y p oint x := (x

1, . . . , x

d) of G, we say that F

is in the max-domain of attrac t ion of G and we cal l G a (mult ivariate) ex treme value distr ibution.

Let F1, . . . , Fd be the marginal distr ibutions of F . The multivar iate max-domain of attraction condit ion

implies d univar iate max-domain of attraction condit ions for the marginal distr ibutions, together with a max-domain of attraction condit ion for the dependence structure. Namely, (2.1) implies the existence of the l imit (2.2)

for al l xfor all x ∈ [0,∞)d. The function l is called the stable tail dependence function, and it is

used to describe the tail dependence structure.

Assuming that the stable tail dependence function belongs to some parametric family

with an unknown parameter θ from a parameter space Θ ⊆ Rp, we define an estimator

θn of θ as the solution of�

[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�

[0,1]dg(x)l(x; θn)dx,

where ln is the nonparametric estimator of l and g : [0, 1]d → Rp is an auxiliary function

that we choose. Here,

ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,

where Rji denotes the rank of Xij among X1j , . . . ,Xnj , i = 1, . . . , n, j = 1, . . . , d and

k ∈ {1, . . . , n}.Note that we do not require that marginal distributions nor the copula of F are

parametric. That is, we consider a large semiparametric model. The introduced es-

timator is a simplified version of an M -estimator introduced in Einmahl et al. (2009)

and it follows the approach of the moment estimator of bivariate stable tail dependence

function introduced in Einmahl et al. (2008). We prove that θn is consistent and asymp-

totically normal. These results do not rely on the continuity, and not even the existence

of the partial derivatives of l (with respect to x), which is the standard requirement

for asymptotic normality of all other estimators of l, the nonparametric one, as well

as the maximum likelihood estimators, see Coles and Tawn (1991); Ledford and Tawn

(1996). The absence of the differentiability assumption enables the estimation of tail

dependence in a wider class of models.

One important model that yields a non-differentiable parametric stable tail depen-

dence function is the factor model. A d-dimensional r-factor model X = (X1, . . . ,Xd)

can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)

where the Zi are independent and heavy-tailed random variables, and bij are nonnegative

numbers such that�r

i=1 bij = 1 for all j = 1, . . . , d. Factor models are rather general

models that are used in many different areas such as psychology or finance. The function

l of the factor model in (2.3) is given by

l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

[0,∞ ) d . The function l is cal led the stable tai l dep endence func tion and it is used to descr ibe the tai l dependence structure. Assuming that the stable tai l dependence function belongs to some parametr ic family with an unk nown parameter

for all x ∈ [0,∞)d. The function l is called the stable tail dependence function, and it is





[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

from a parameter space






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

, we define an estimator






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

of






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

as the solution of

where






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

is the nonparametric estimator of l and






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

is an

auxiliary function that we choose. Here,

where R ji denotes the rank of X i j

among X 1j , . . . ,X nj , i = 1, . . . , n , j = 1, . . . , d and k for all x ∈ [0,∞)d. The function l is called the stable tail dependence function, and it is





[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

{1, . . . , n}.

Note that we do not require that marginal distr ibutions nor the copula of F are parametr ic. That is, we consider a large semiparametr ic model . The introduced estimator is a s implif ied version of an M-est imator introduced in einmahl et al . (2009) and it fol lows the approach of the moment estimator of the bivar iate stable tai l dependence function introduced in einmahl et al . (2008) . We prove that






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

is consistent and asymptotical ly normal . These results do not rely on the continuity and not even on the existence of the par t ial der ivatives of l (with respect to x ) , which is the standard requirement for asymptotic normality of al l other est imators of l , the nonparametr ic one, as well as the maximum l ikel ihood estimators, see coles and Tawn (1991); Ledford and Tawn (1996). The absence of the differentiabil ity assumption enables the estimation of tai l dependence in a wider class of models.

One impor tant model that yields a non-differentiable parametr ic stable tai l dependence function is the fac tor mo del . A d-dimensional r-factor model x = (x

1, . . . ,x

d) can be

defined by

where the Zi are independent and

heavy-tai led random variables and the b

ij are nonnegative numbers

such that






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

for all j=1, . . . , d. factor models are rather general models that are used in many

of real numbers such that

P

�

maxi=1...,n Xi − bn

an

≤ x

�

= Fn (anx + bn) → G(x), as n → ∞, (1.1)

for every continuity point of G, we say that F is in the max-domain of attraction of G,

and call G an extreme value distribution.

The max-domain of attraction condition (1.1) provides a (limit) model for the right tail

of a distribution.

Extreme value theory is often used in finance, for estimating Value-at-Risk, Expected

Shortfall and other risk measures of a portfolio. The named two involve estimation of

a very high quantile or estimation of a very small probability, which is where extreme

value theory is used. Instead of looking at the return on the whole portfolio, we might be

interested in the interactions between the stocks that portfolio is made of. For example,

it is very useful to know how will the crash of one stock influence the returns on other

stocks in the portfolio. The notion of extremal or tail dependence is introduced to

describe this connection, and for that the multivariate extreme value theory is required.

2 Multivariate extreme value theory

Defining the maximum of n vectors of dimension d to be a vector consisting of the

componentwise maxima: the first element of that vector is the maximum of all first

elements, the second element is the maximum of all second elements over n vectors, and

so on, we generalize the univariate max-domain of attraction condition in the following

way.

Definition 2.1 Let X1, . . . ,Xn be a random sample from a continuous d-variate dis-

tribution function F , Xi = (Xi1, . . . ,Xid), i = 1, . . . , n. If there exist positive sequences

(an,1), . . . , (an,d) and sequences (bn,1), . . . , (bn,d) of real numbers such that as n → ∞,

Fn(an,1x1 + bn,1, . . . , an,dxd + bn,d) → G(x) (2.1)

for every continuity point x := (x1, . . . , xd) of G, we say that F is in the max-domain

of attraction of G, and we call G a (multivariate) extreme value distribution.

Let F1, . . . , Fd be the marginal distributions of F . The multivariate max-domain

of attraction condition implies d univariate max-domain of attraction conditions for

the marginal distributions, together with a max-domain of attraction condition for the

dependence structure. Namely, (2.1) implies the existence of the limit

limt↓0

t−1P (1− F1(X11) ≤ tx1 or . . . or 1− Fd(X1d) ≤ txd) =: l(x), (2.2)

2


P

�


an

≤ x

�

= Fn (anx + bn) → G(x), as n → ∞, (1.1)




of a distribution.














way.











limt↓0


2


P

�


an

≤ x

�

= Fn (anx + bn) → G(x), as n → ∞, (1.1)




of a distribution.














way.











limt↓0


2






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

We illustrate the behavior of the above estimator on a 3-dimensional model with 3

factors. We simulated 500 samples of size n = 5000 from a model

X1 = max{0.5Z1, 0.2Z2, 0.3Z3}X2 = max{0.4Z1, 0.5Z2, 0.1Z3}X3 = max{0.3Z1, 0.3Z2, 0.4Z3},

with independent factors Z1, Z2 and Z3 following a standard Frechet distribution,

FZ1(x) = exp{−1/x}. The unknown parameter is θ = (0.5, 0.4, 0.3, 0.2, 0.5, 0.3), and the

other 3 parameters are determined by the model. The auxiliary function g = (g1, . . . , g6)

is given by gi(x) = xi, gi+3(x) = x2i , i = 1, 2, 3.

200 400 600 800 1000

0.00

00.

005

0.01

00.

015

0.02

00.

025

k

RM

SE

θ1=0.5, θ2=0.4, θ3=0.3

θ1θ2θ3

(a)

200 400 600 800 1000

0.00

00.

005

0.01

00.

015

0.02

00.

025

0.03

0

k

RM

SE

θ4=0.2, θ5=0.5, θ6=0.3

θ4θ5θ6

(b)

Figure 1: 3-dimensional 3-factor model, estimation of θ1 = 0.5, θ2 = 0.4, θ3 = 0.3,

θ4 = 0.2, θ5 = 0.5, θ6 = 0.3

Figure 1 shows the root mean squared errors of the estimator of θ. The 6 parameters

appear to have been estimated well, the root mean squared errors being in the range

from 0.01 up to 0.015.

References

Coles, S. G. and J. A. Tawn (1991). Modelling extreme multivariate events. Journal of

the Royal Statistical Society, Series B 53, 377–392.

de Haan, L. and A. Ferreira (2006). Extreme Value Theory: An Introduction. New

York: Springer.

4

F i g u r e 1 : 3 - d i m e n s i o n a l 3 - f a c t o r m o d e l , e s t i m a t i o n o f θ

1 = 0 . 5 , θ

2 = 0 . 4 , θ

3 = 0 . 3

�� Nekst 3 - March 2010

Extreme value theory is the part of probability and statistics that provides the theoretical background for

modeling events that almost never happen. the interest for these events originates from their potentially large

consequences, such as in the case of a big flood or a stock market crash. Examples of extreme events come from

fields such as meteorology, finance, non-life insurance and reinsurance, internet page ranking, and even athletics.

Univariate ex treme value theor yextreme value theor y developed in paral lel to the more widely k nown central l imit theor y.The central l imit theorem, loosely spoken, states that i f an experiment is repeated many t imes independently and under the same condit ions, the random variable modeling the average outcome of the experiment wil l approximately fol low the standard normal distr ibution.

formally, i f X1, . . . ,X

n are independent

random variables with the same distr ibution with mean μ and f inite var iance σ 2, then

where Z is a random variable fol lowing a standard normal distr ibution. The theor y of extreme values was inspired by the fol lowing question: “ What happens to the l imit distr ibution in the central l imit theorem when the sequence of par t ial sums is replaced by the sequence of par t ial maxima?” An example of a car t ire fai lure from De Haan and ferreira (2006) i l lustrates these paral lel approaches. The t ire wil l go f lat either as a consequence of an extreme event (a nai l or a hole in the road, for example) or as a consequence of a sum of many small events (due to wearing out over t ime).

consider independent random variables X

1, . . . ,X

n f rom a distr ibution function F.

extreme value theor y establ ishes under which condit ions on F there exists a sequence (a

n) of posit ive numbers and a

sequence (bn) of real numbers such that

as n → ∞,

where the distribution of Y is non-degenerate and describes the possible distributions of Y .

Definition 1.1I f there exists a sequence (a

n) of p osit ive

numb ers and a sequence (bn) of real

numb ers such that:

as n → ∞. For every continuity point of G, we say that F is in the max-domain of attraction of G and we call G an extreme value distribution.

The max-domain of attraction condit ion (1.1) provides a ( l imit) model for the r ight tai l of a distr ibution.

extreme value theor y is often used in f inance for est imating Value-at-Risk, expected Shor tfal l and other r isk measures of a por tfol io. The named two involve estimation of a ver y high quanti le or est imation of a ver y small probabil ity, for which extreme value theor y is used. Instead of look ing at the return on the whole por tfol io, we might be interested in the interactions between the stocks of which the por tfol io consists. for example, i t is ver y useful to k now how the crash of one stock wil l inf luence the returns on other stocks in the por tfol io. The notion of ex tremal or tai l dep endence is introduced to descr ibe this connection. for this notion, the multivariate ex treme value theor y is required.

Multivariate ex treme value theor yDefining the maximum of n vectors of dimension d to be a vector consist ing of

S t I M A t I N g E x t r E M A l

D E P E N D E N C E

Name: Andrea Krajina

Position:PhD Student

T R I A N G L e

Estimating extremal dependence

Extreme value theory is the part of probability and statistics that provides the

theoretical background for modeling events that almost never happen. The interest in

these events originates from their potentially large consequences, like in the case of a

big flood or a stock market crash. Examples of extreme events come from fields such

as meteorology (floods, wind storms, heavy rainfall, large scale forest fires), finance,

non-life insurance and re-insurance, internet page ranking, even athletics.

1 Univariate extreme value theory

Extreme value theory developed in parallel to the more widely known central limit the-

ory. The central limit theorem, loosely speaking, says that if an experiment is repeated

many times independently and under the same conditions, the random variable mod-

eling the average outcome of the experiment will approximately follow the standard

normal distribution. Formally, if X1, . . . ,Xn are independent random variables with

the same distribution with mean µ and finite variance σ2, then

�ni=1 Xi − nµ

σ√

n

d→ Z, as n → ∞,

where Z is a random variable following a standard normal distribution. The theory of

extreme values was inspired by the following question: “What happens with the limit

distribution in the central limit theorem when the sequence of partial sums is replaced

by the sequence of partial maxima?”. An example of a car tire failure from de Haan

and Ferreira (2006) illustrates these parallel approaches. The tire will go flat either as

a consequence of an extreme event (a nail or a hole in the road, for example) or as a

consequence of a sum of many small events (due to wearing out over time).

Consider independent random variables X1, . . . ,Xn from a distribution function F .

Extreme value theory establishes under which conditions on F there exists a sequence

(an) of positive numbers and a sequence (bn) of real numbers such that as n → ∞,

maxi=1,...,n Xi − bn

an

d→ Y,

where the distribution of Y is non-degenerate; and it describes the possible distributions

of Y .

Definition 1.1 If there exists a sequence (an) of positive numbers and a sequence (bn)

1

Estimating extremal dependence

Extreme value theory is the part of probability and statistics that provides the

theoretical background for modeling events that almost never happen. The interest in

these events originates from their potentially large consequences, like in the case of a

big flood or a stock market crash. Examples of extreme events come from fields such

as meteorology (floods, wind storms, heavy rainfall, large scale forest fires), finance,

non-life insurance and re-insurance, internet page ranking, even athletics.

1 Univariate extreme value theory

Extreme value theory developed in parallel to the more widely known central limit the-

ory. The central limit theorem, loosely speaking, says that if an experiment is repeated

many times independently and under the same conditions, the random variable mod-

eling the average outcome of the experiment will approximately follow the standard

normal distribution. Formally, if X1, . . . ,Xn are independent random variables with

the same distribution with mean µ and finite variance σ2, then

�ni=1 Xi − nµ

σ√

n

d→ Z, as n → ∞,

where Z is a random variable following a standard normal distribution. The theory of

extreme values was inspired by the following question: “What happens with the limit

distribution in the central limit theorem when the sequence of partial sums is replaced

by the sequence of partial maxima?”. An example of a car tire failure from de Haan

and Ferreira (2006) illustrates these parallel approaches. The tire will go flat either as

a consequence of an extreme event (a nail or a hole in the road, for example) or as a

consequence of a sum of many small events (due to wearing out over time).

Consider independent random variables X1, . . . ,Xn from a distribution function F .

Extreme value theory establishes under which conditions on F there exists a sequence

(an) of positive numbers and a sequence (bn) of real numbers such that as n → ∞,

maxi=1,...,n Xi − bn

an

d→ Y,

where the distribution of Y is non-degenerate; and it describes the possible distributions

of Y .

Definition 1.1 If there exists a sequence (an) of positive numbers and a sequence (bn)

1


P

�


an

≤ x

�

= Fn (anx + bn) → G(x), as n → ∞, (1.1)




of a distribution.














way.











limt↓0


2

R I S I C O M A N A G E M E N T | E M P L O Y E E B E N E F I T S | V E R Z E K E R I N G E N

RUIMTEvoor beweging

Om jezelf te ontplooien, heb je ruimte nodig.

Om het beste uit jezelf te halen, heb je ruimte nodig.

Om creatief en flexibel te werken, heb je ruimte nodig.

Aon geeft je die ruimte.

Zodat jij ons kan overtuigen van jouw kracht en expertise.

Zodat jij kunt bewegen tussen risicomanagement en pensioenadvies.

Zodat jij in beweging blijft.

www.werkenbijaon.nl

6231ac_def:Layout 2 25-02-2010 17:25 Pagina 1


different areas such as psychology and f inance. The function l of the factor model in (2.3) is given by

We i l lustrate the behaviour of the above estimator on a 3-dimensional model with 3 factors. We simulated 500 samples of s ize n = 5000 from a model

x1 = max{0.5Z1, 0 .2Z

2, 0 .3Z

3}

x2 = max{0.4Z1, 0 .5Z

2, 0 .1Z

3}

x3 = max{0.3Z1, 0 .3Z

2, 0 .4Z

3} ,

with independent factors Z1, Z

2 and

Z3 fol lowing a standard frechet

distr ibution, FZ1

(x) = exp{−1/x } . The unk nown parameter is






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

= (0.5, 0 .4, 0 .3, 0 .2, 0 .5, 0 .3) and the other 3 parameters are determined by the model . The auxi l iar y function g = (g

1, . . . , g

6) is given by g

i(x) = x

i,

gi+3

(x ) = x 2i , i = 1, 2 , 3 .

figure 1 and 2 show the root mean squared errors of the estimator of θ. The 6 parameters appear to have been estimated well , with the root mean squared errors being in the range from 0.01 up to 0.015. |

references

coles, S . G. and J . A. Tawn (1991). Modell ing extreme

multivar iate events. Journal of the Royal Statist ical

S o ciet y, S er ies B 53, 377–392.

de Haan, L . and A. ferreira (2006) . Ex treme Value

Theor y : A n Intro duc tion. New York: Springer.

einmahl, J . H. J . , A. Kraj ina, and J . Segers (2008) . A

method of moments estimator of tai l dependence.

B ernoul l i 14 , 1003–1026.

einmahl, J . H. J . , A. Kraj ina, and J . Segers (2009) . An M-

estimator of tai l dependence in arbitrar y dimensions.

work in progress.

Ledford, A. W. and J . A. Tawn (1996). Statist ics for

near independence in mult ivar iate extreme values.

Biometrika 83 , 169–187.

We illustrate the behavior of the above estimator on a 3-dimensional model with 3

factors. We simulated 500 samples of size n = 5000 from a model

X1 = max{0.5Z1, 0.2Z2, 0.3Z3}X2 = max{0.4Z1, 0.5Z2, 0.1Z3}X3 = max{0.3Z1, 0.3Z2, 0.4Z3},

with independent factors Z1, Z2 and Z3 following a standard Frechet distribution,

FZ1(x) = exp{−1/x}. The unknown parameter is θ = (0.5, 0.4, 0.3, 0.2, 0.5, 0.3), and the

other 3 parameters are determined by the model. The auxiliary function g = (g1, . . . , g6)

is given by gi(x) = xi, gi+3(x) = x2i , i = 1, 2, 3.

200 400 600 800 1000

0.00

00.

005

0.01

00.

015

0.02

00.

025

k

RM

SE

θ1=0.5, θ2=0.4, θ3=0.3

θ1θ2θ3

(a)

200 400 600 800 1000

0.00

00.

005

0.01

00.

015

0.02

00.

025

0.03

0

k

RM

SE

θ4=0.2, θ5=0.5, θ6=0.3

θ4θ5θ6

(b)

Figure 1: 3-dimensional 3-factor model, estimation of θ1 = 0.5, θ2 = 0.4, θ3 = 0.3,

θ4 = 0.2, θ5 = 0.5, θ6 = 0.3

Figure 1 shows the root mean squared errors of the estimator of θ. The 6 parameters

appear to have been estimated well, the root mean squared errors being in the range

from 0.01 up to 0.015.

References

Coles, S. G. and J. A. Tawn (1991). Modelling extreme multivariate events. Journal of

the Royal Statistical Society, Series B 53, 377–392.

de Haan, L. and A. Ferreira (2006). Extreme Value Theory: An Introduction. New

York: Springer.

4






[0,1]dg(x)ln(x)dx =

�




ln(x) :=1

k

n�

i=1

1

�

R1i > n +

1

2− kx1 or . . . or Rd

i > n +1

2− kxd

�

,















can be defined by

Xj = maxi=1,...,r

{bijZi}, j = 1, . . . , d, (2.3)






l(x) =r

�

i=1

maxj=1,...,d

{bijxj}.

3

F i g u r e 2 : 3 - d i m e n s i o n a l 3 - f a c t o r m o d e l , e s t i m a t i o n o f θ

4 = 0 . 2 , θ

5 = 0 . 5 , θ

6 = 0 . 3


the morning after the house warming party. As the party took place just a few days before New Year, they had made fritters (Dutch: oliebollen). That morning, however, Patrick found some of those lying in his bed, put there by his housemates. “Since that day, I always lock my door at night!”

the roomPatrick is very pleased with the house and his room. His room is not too small and looks neat, apart from the clothes that are lying around. Patrick even has his own sink. As mentioned before, Patrick is hardly ever in his room. Nonetheless, he would have liked a bigger window. Besides that, there is nothing that he would like to change.

As soon as we want to take a picture of his room, Patrick notes that he wants to clean up first, which gives us the opportunity to gossip about him with his friends downstairs. We ask them about the things they find annoying about Patrick. “Actually nothing,” is the response. “However, he is sometimes pretty annoying when he is drunk.” We find out that Sikko is the most responsible of the three. Sikko tells us that he likes his first year as an econometrician, but strangely he is not familiar with Nekst. He supposes that he is not a member of Asset | econometrics. After telling him about our nice study association and the upcoming après ski drink – about which Patrick told him as well – he promises that he will become a member if he likes

the drink. With the great drinks of Asset | econometrics in mind, we are sure that we can consider him as a member from now on.

After taking a picture of Patrick’s room and thanking him and his friends for the dinner and interview, we are ready to leave. Before we leave, however, Patrick asks us to put a dot on the map of Tilburg that is hanging on the wall in the hallway. He asks everyone he knows to put a dot on the location where they live to get a nice overview. We feel honoured to be among the first to leave our marks on the map before going home. Maybe you will be the next to put a dot on the map? |

Text by: Bart Kruize

P a t r i c k ’ s r o o m


Passing the frozen Pius harbour, Nekst is about to visit Patrick Kuijpers and his housemates. After we have

been shaken severely by cycling over the cobblestones that are typical for an old neighbourhood, we finally

arrive at number 2� in the Van de Coulsterstraat, where Patrick lives.

We are looking at an ordinary family house: nothing reveals that students live in this house. After knocking on the window – since the doorbell does not work – Patrick opens the door and welcomes us. The first object that catches our attention upon entering the hallway is a huge flag of football club PSV eindhoven. Patrick and his housemates are all supporting PSV as can also be concluded from their living room, which is full of countless items related to the aforementioned football club.

Something else that amazed us is the size of the living room, which is extremely large. Patrick thinks that it has a total surface of approximately seventy square metres. Patrick’s housemates, Job and Sikko, are in the living room and kindly welcome us as well. Today, chicken Tonight Hawaii is on the menu. As dinner is not ready yet, Patrick uses the time to show us around the house. Highlights of the tour are the garden full of empty beer crates, the terrace on the roof, and Patrick’s room. Patrick tells us that he is only in his room when he needs to sleep. He and his housemates are always in the living room, where the television, laptops, and Playstation are. What do you need more?

When dinner is ready, we move over to the couch and have dinner with the plate on our lap watching comedies on the television. This is a tradition according to Patrick and his housemates, as they do this almost every evening. After dinner, we can finally start with the official interview, although we already made sure that we got the most important information about Patrick and his housemates during dinner. After all, we are still nosy journalists. living with friendsOn the question why he wanted to live in lodges, Patrick answers: “It is nice and relaxed

to live on your own with friends.” Patrick and his housemates are from Oss, a city in Brabant, and know each other from working at a super market. Because they all study in Tilburg, they decided to look for a place where they could live together. “This was not easily done,” Patrick admits. “Most people do not want to rent their house to students.” fortunately, after having searched for half a year, they found a house that suited them very well. As of this year, Sikko also studies econometrics at Tilburg University. According to Patrick, he convinced Sikko to study econometrics. Sikko, on the other hand, does not agree with him and says that even though he came into contact with econometrics via Patrick, he might have studied it anyway.

Patrick enjoys his life as a student and he definitely likes living in lodges with his friends. for Patrick, the best aspects of the house are the big living room, the giant television, and the couches. even though they are students, Patrick and his housemates cook together on a regular basis. Do they ever order any food? Yes, they do. In fact, they order food quite often, but only as a sort of ‘second dinner’ in the evening. furthermore, they clean together as well. They always clean the house on fridays and they do not even need a cleaning schedule on the big whiteboard in the living room. The whiteboard does contain their study programme for each day of the week and Patrick seems to have a busy schedule. The whiteboard reminds Patrick of something else as well, namely a good wiper for the whiteboard.

Patrick, Job and Sikko have been living in this house for almost four months now and we would like to know all the highs and lows so far. Patrick: “The absolute highlight of the past four months is the house warming party. There were about fifty people and the next day we noticed that there were empty beer bottles everywhere.” The low so far has been

r o M o S S t o t I l b U r g

Name: Patrick Kuijpers

begin studies:2007

Address: Van de Coulsterstraat 25

L I V I N G I N L O D G e S

room surface:12m2

Monthly rent: 365 euros

Age:21


t H E D r I N K S & A C t I V I t I E S

C o M M I t t E Ec O M M I T T e e P R O f I L e

Let me first shortly introduce you to our five committee members. Bart van Schuppen is our one and only chairman, also known as ‘the boss’ or ‘meneer de voorzitter’ (Mister chairman). Joep Olde Juninck is our treasurer and his job is to check how many free barrels of beer, how many free pizzas and how many fun trips to the skating rink we can enjoy. More about this later. Pascal Heuijerjans is in function ‘just’ a committee member, but in actions he is at least as great as all of the other committee members, being always ready to act as Sinterklaas or to throw a big party. from the board, we have Stephanie van Breda, who keeps an eye on us such that everything runs smoothly, and I am Robbert van Oosten, the secretary.

Now that you know who you are dealing with, we can start having a look at what we did this year and what is yet to come. We started this academic year with our first activity on 14 October: the Game Afternoon. All members of Asset | econometrics were invited and they could have a delicious pizza for free. It was no surprise that two rooms on the first floor of the Warande building were completely filled with econometricians, who were all having a good time. This all sounds very straightforward and smoothly – it indeed went smoothly – though it was far from easy to organise this event. To arrange this, we had to design and put up some posters, talk with students and give all students the opportunity to subscribe themselves. furthermore, we had to buy chips, cola, fanta, committee shirts and of course we had to find a company that would be crazy enough to deliver us about seventy pizzas. Not to mention that we had to think about all of this beforehand, while trying to stay within a certain budget and writing a lot of minutes as well. However, thanks to iron teamwork and great leadership from Bart, this was all done without any big problems.

Let me tell you something more about the drinks. The big question is always: what should its theme be? We have already had a ‘Holiday on Ice’, ‘Sinterklaas Missed the Boat’ and New Year’s drink. We will let you know soon enough what the next themes will be. Nevertheless, one thing is for sure: it is going to be a lot of fun! A big advantage of going to the drinks of Asset | econometrics is that there will always be free barrels of beer. To be honest, there are so many free barrels that I have had more free beers compared to the amount of beers I paid for at the drinks. A few weeks ago, we also decided to offer canei especially for the ladies. It is quite an effort to promote these drinks, arrange things for the theme and prepare the pub for the guests, but this is a small effort compared to the good time you get in return.

There is so much more to tell you about, but I am afraid I have to stop here, because else we are going to get problems with the editorial staff of Nekst. Let me conclude this story by telling you that we are going to have four more drinks, one more activity and a football tournament this year, which you certainly do not want to miss at any cost! See you there! |

Name: Robbert van Oosten

Age:19

begin studies:2008

It is an honour for me to tell you about the greatest, funniest and most important committee of our study

association, which we call the Drinks & Activities committee, or in short: D&A. We are about halfway through

this academic year and we have already had two activities and four drinks with the D&A and there is so much

more to come this year!


o f f E E W I t H M A t H I J S b o U M A N

L e D : N A T I O N A L e c O N O M e T R I c I A N S D A Y

The committee consisted of seven members. Thijs Bender was the chairman, Raymon Ruijter, Ignacio Bruin, and Marieke Klein took care of the companies and Lianne Marks formed the financial brain. Hylke Spoelstra became secretary and I, Marleen van Kalmthout, had to take care of the public relations for the LeD.

In the beginning, my main job became looking for the perfect location and finding speakers for the opening and the debate. At one moment in time, the committee decided that we should ask Alexander Rinnooy Kan to participate in the debate. After all, he is a famous person in the field of economics and is known as the most influential person in the Netherlands (editorial note: find out more about Mr Rinnooy Kan in the December edition of Nekst 2008). As Rinnooy Kan joined a debate during the student week of Amsterdam in May 2009, Thijs and I went to the debate in order to have a look. After hearing a great debate, we were even more impressed by the intelligence and debating skills of this famous man. Therefore, we were very nervous as we walked up to him in order to ask him to join the debate on the LeD. It appeared that it was unnecessary to be so nervous, since he was not only intelligent and convincing, but also very nice and enthusiastic about our project. Within five minutes, we received his business card and the instruction to call his assistant to check whether or not he was still available on the LeD. fortunately, he was able to come and the first debater had been arranged.

Hylke accepted the job of inviting Arjo Klamer for the debate and finding a speaker for the opening of the LeD became my task. During one of the meetings – these usually lasted for at least two hours – we decided that Mathijs Bouman would be a suitable candidate. He was very enthusiastic as well, so all the speakers for the day were arranged.

My next task was searching for nice gadgets for the promotion. This was something I really enjoyed. I think I searched the internet for at least 25 hours and I also browsed many magazines with goodies in order to find the right gadgets. I really liked the gadgets of this year, especially the Mikado games, but I assume you saw the goodies yourself as well. We promoted the LeD in January and it was a great experience. We had some fun road trips and the opportunity to have a look at the other universities.

After the promotion, I continued arranging the presents for the day itself. The committee was very enthusiastic about the idea of garment bags, so we had to search for a nice store offering garment bags of a good quality. Since those bags turned out to be rather expensive, we decided to look for a sponsor. The Society Shop wanted to help us and all we had to do was finding a printer. As the garment bags were sponsored by the Society Shop, the organisation itself did not have a real present, so we decided to give a fashion roller as well.

During the day, everyone got his or her own responsibilities. My job was to take care of the opening and the debate. It was really nice to do, since I had coffee with Mathijs Bouman all morning and I had coffee with Arjo Klamer and Alexander Rinnooy Kan in the afternoon. The last week before the LeD, we agreed on clearing our schedule in order to arrange the final things. We had to pick up the garment bags, print the maps, fill the goodie bags, etcetera. It was a hectic, but nice week.

The day itself was amazing. except for a few moments of stress, the day went perfectly. This was also thanks to the 22 volunteers walking around and helping us with the organisation. We really enjoyed the day and we hope you enjoyed it as well. See you next year! |

Name: Marleen van Kalmthout

Age:22

University: University of

Amsterdam

over a year ago, the lED committee 2010 was set up by Kraket and VSAE, which are two econometrics study

associations in Amsterdam. this cooperation resulted in a great committee with members of Kraket as well

as members of VSAE. the committee received the task to organise the national econometricians day, better

known as lED.

T h e D r i n k s & A c t i v i t i e s C o m m i t t e e

Nekst 3 - March 2010 ��

tuesday 30 MarchBeer or Wine Tasting and Lecture DrinkThere are many different kinds of beer and wine. Since students are rather familiar with the common brands of alcoholic beverages, the Drinks & Activities committee decided that it was about time that students would also get to know the differences between several other kinds of beer or wine. Therefore, there will be a dinner and a beer or wine tasting at The Gallery on 30 March. Afterwards, there will be a lecture by TNO and a drink at café Qwibus.

friday 2 AprilMembers DayOn friday 2 April, the Members Day of Asset | econometrics will take place. We will visit efteling on this wonderful day. It will be a day full of fairy tales, roller coasters, and of course Pardoes. After our visit to the World of Miracles, there will be a dinner in Tilburg.

friday 9 April – Sunday 11 AprilActive Members WeekendDuring the Active Members Weekend, all active members are going to have the best weekend of the year! Nobody knows where the weekend will take place and what activities will be done until the very last moment. By means of this weekend, the board of Asset | econometrics would like to thank all the active members for their efforts during this academic year.

Monday 12 AprilStart Secret ActivityThis year, all members of Asset | econometrics are invited to face the biggest challenge they will ever run into. On Monday 12 April, you can get instructions. The challenge will start on 13 April and will last until 26 April. curious? Join this challenge!

tuesday 13 AprilFreshmen ActivityOn 13 April, the last freshmen Activity of this academic year will take place. The committee is still thinking of a perfect activity for the freshmen, but there will be more information available soon. If you are interested in a great evening with your classmates, then keep an eye on your inbox!

Wednesday 28 AprilFootball Symposium and DrinkOn 28 April, Asset | econometrics illustrates how to combine econometrics and football. Many econometrical and mathematical theories have already been used to predict the outcome of football tournaments and form the ultimate team. Do you want to know how to combine your study expertise and this great sport?

friday 14 May – Sunday 1� MayKOALAOf course, Asset | econometrics does not forget its former active members. During this weekend, former active members of our association will gather together and will live as a student for one weekend again. This will definitely be a weekend full of fun!

Wednesday 9 JuneFootball Tournament and Announcement Drinkevery year, Asset | econometrics organises a football tournament, in which all students and lecturers can participate. Subscribe with a team and show off your football skills! Afterwards, the candidate board of Asset | econometrics for the academic year 2010-2011 will be announced.

g r A D U A t E S

T O c O N c L U D e

P l A N N I N g

over the past months, the following econometricians obtained their bachelor’s and master’s degree. Asset |

Econometrics would like to congratulate:

Name: Ali Burak KurtulanTitle: correlations in economic capital Models for Pension fund PoolingSupervisors: Dr R. J. A. Laeven, Prof. Dr J. M. Schumacher

Name: Dave van DurenTitle: feasibility of Time Period IndicationSupervisors: Prof. Dr G. Kant, Drs J. J. M. Braat

T O c O N c L U D e


English QuotesMr Ten Raa during a lecture of the course Auctions and Public Sector economics: “If you wake me up and ask what I was dreaming of, then I will say that I was dreaming of an edgeworth Box.”

Mr Ten Raa during a lecture of the course Auctions and Public Sector economics: “If I object that my apples are taken by the Bolsheviks, I will be killed. for simplicity.”

Mr Drost during a lecture of the course Life Insurance: “Now we get exactly, more or less the same formula.”

Mr Ten Raa discovers some formulas on the blackboard at the start of the course Auctions and Public Sector economics: “I do not know from which course these notes are, but all economic courses are approximately the same, so I will just use these notes!”

frederic Vermeulen during a lecture of the course Regression Analysis: “If you do not see a zero here, then your regression probably went bananas!”

Mr Ten Raa during a lecture of the course Auctions and Public Sector economics: “first, this university was called ‘catholic High School Tilburg’, which is abbreviated to KHT in Dutch. However, after deciding to turn it into a university, they did not call it KUT, since this is hard to swallow for Dutch people.”

Mr Ashayeri during a lecture of the course Production Management: “If you make a car, you will not get a by-product as in the chemical industry, such as a small car.”

Mr croux during a lecture of the course Regression Analysis: “It is a very easy function, so the person who made it up, has already passed away.”

Dutch QuotesAnouk Rennen: “Ik was op zoek naar Nieuwenhuis.” Marleen Balvert: “Ben je op zoek naar een nieuw huis?”

Ramon van Schaik over de ploegenachtervolging van de vrouwen tijdens de Olympische Spelen: “Wij hebben Sven Kramer, die rijdt hen er zo uit!”

Harold van Heijst: “81 keer 40 cent, dat is ongeveer, eh... 120 euro!”

Dhr. Talman begrijpt niet waarom chinezen te laat komen bij zijn colleges: “Als het college om kwart voor negen begint, dan komen

de laatste chinezen nog om kwart over negen binnendruppelen, terwijl het in china dan al avond is!”

Harold van Heijst: “Gisteren in de Mensa kregen we zuurkool met aardappels en speklappen. er zat niet eens groente bij!” frans fonville: “We kunnen Tinbergen wel interviewen.” Bart Kruize: “ Die is al zo’n 15 jaar geleden overleden.”

Harold van Heijst: “Marleen zegt ook vaak een zin zonder woorden.”

elske Leenaars: “Op welke foto’s staat de computer?”

Thomas Geelen: “Het is toch stom dat een schip tegen een boot aanrijdt.”

Wilbert Kistemaker tijdens het uitzoeken van hostels voor de vakantie: “Dit hostel heeft Wi-fi, dat is toch een soort spel?”

Linda Vos: “De regel bevestigt de uitzondering!”

Harold van Heijst: “Ken je de film 2012? Dat is dit jaar en dan over twee jaar.”

elske Leenaars: “Selexyz Gianotten, wie kent die niet?” claudia Rommens: “Dan is Selexyz toch de voornaam?”

emy van der Wielen tijdens de LeD: “Kijk naar de boot voor het gebouw. Die heeft een lekke band!”

elske Leenaars vraagt aan frans fonville waar hij van plan is om naartoe te gaan: “Ga je naar Londen of naar engeland?”

frans fonville: “Parallel is toch twee keer met dubbel ‘ l ’ ?”

Stefan Damen voor het tentamen van Quantitative finance: “een black-out bij dit vak is volgens mij onmogelijk. een Black Scholes daarentegen; dat kan wel!”

Linda Vos volgt een interview met erica Terpstra op televisie: “Misschien ontmoet ze nog wel Kim Jong-il, die schaatser!”

frans fonville staat in de keuken van Pascal Heuijerjans: “Wow! Jullie hebben gewoon een vloer in jullie keuken!”

Mystery Quatsch“Ik heb hier p*, x* en y*. Ik zie allemaal sterretjes!”

U A t S C H !

R e M A R K A B L e Q U O T e S

fortunately, the editorial staff of Nekst received many quotes over the past months. Maybe you will even

know who made the Mystery Quatsch? If so, please mail your solution to [email protected] to win

a nice prize! of course, you can still mail all remarkable quotes you have heard to this email address as well!

Excellent enough to make a difference?

(Aankomende) actuarissen – M/V

Bij Ernst & Young werken accountants, belastingadviseurs en gespecialiseerde

adviseurs in vrijwel elke richting van de fi nanciële, juridische en notariële

dienstverlening. Met ruim 4.500 medewerkers verspreid over 17 kantoren zijn

we een van de grootste adviesorganisaties in Nederland. Er is bij ons altijd

ruimte voor ambitieuze starters die het verschil willen maken.

Ga jij de fi nancieel directeur van een verzekeraar adviseren over een nieuwe

premiestructuur of het toeslagenbeleid van een pensioenfonds toetsen? Of ben

je meer geïnteresseerd in de modellen die beleggingsfondsen gebruiken bij de

waardering van hun portfolio’s. Ernst & Young Actuarissen biedt de mogelijkheid

om je breed te ontwikkelen op zowel inhoudelijk als persoonlijk vlak. Wij zijn

onderdeel van een Europese organisatie waarin actuarissen uit alle fi nanciële

centra van Europa samenwerken. In de dynamische markt waarin wij werken

hebben wij continu nieuwe adviseurs nodig. Voor onze kantoren in Amsterdam

en Utrecht zijn wij op zoek naar (Aankomende) actuarissen.

Ben je gedreven, leergierig, analytisch en adviseer je liever dan dat je

wordt geadviseerd. Dan heb jij de instelling die wij zoeken. Wij bieden jou

de mogelijkheid om na je studie als beginnend actuaris aan de slag te gaan.

Ook kun je tijdens je studie voor een dag in de week aan de slag gaan als

werkstudent of je afstudeerscriptie schrijven over een praktijk probleem.

Voor meer informatie kun je contact opnemen met Vivien Belle, 06-21251836 of [email protected]. Solliciteren kan op www.ey.nl/carriere

2058609133 Adv Actuarissen A4.indd 1 11-12-2009 11:19:50


one hundredTry to make 100 with the numbers 1, …, 9 using the following rules: • each number should be used exactly once. • You are only allowed to use the operation ‘addition’. • Two numbers may be combined to form a new number (for example, 2 and 4 become 24 or 42). • Two numbers may be combined to form a fraction (for example, 2 and 4 become 2/4 or 4/2).

Marblescan you place 10 marbles in 5 lines such that there are exactly 4 marbles on each line?

DatesThe date 19.11.1999 only consists of odd numbers and is therefore called ‘odd’. The date 02.02.2000 only consists of even numbers and is therefore called ‘even’. What is the first odd date after 02.02.2000 and what is the most recent even date before 19.11.1999?

Playing cardsWith respect to the cards in figure 1, the following statement is made: on the back of every card with an even number is a vowel. What is the minimum amount of cards that you should flip in order to check this statement and which cards should you check?

WindowsThere are two windows in the façade of a new house. Both windows have a height of 1 metre and a width of 1 metre. However, one window is two times as big as the other one. How is this possible?

MultiplicationMultiply the number abcd (consisting of exactly four characters) by 4. The result is dcba. What is the number?

treasurefive econometricians from different years find a treasure of 100 gold coins in the office of Prof. Dr Borm. They decide to split the coins using the following scheme.

The oldest student proposes how to share the coins and all econometricians remaining will vote in favour of or against the proposal. If 50% or more of the students vote in favour of the proposal, then the coins will be shared in that way. Otherwise, the student proposing the scheme will be thrown out of the window and the process is repeated with the remaining students.

Assuming that all five econometricians are rational, greedy, aim to survive, and paid attention during the lectures of Game Theory, what will happen?

this time, Nekst presents an entirely different puzzle to you. It is actually a mathematics contest, in which the

person who solves all puzzles correctly will win the prize. In the unfortunate case of no completely correct

answer, Nekst will choose a winner from all participants at random. therefore, only solving a single puzzle

may as well result in winning a nice prize. What are you waiting for?

M A t H E M A t I C S C o N t E S t

P U Z Z L e

F i g u r e 1 : P l a y i n g c a r d s

F i g u r e 2 : T r e a s u r e c h e s t

<On the pursuit of professionalism >

We view professionalism as the product of excellentabilities and execution. We pride ourselves on it in everythingwe do. Being professional is about setting the higheststandards of performance and wanting to excel. If you havethe same standards, we would like to hear from you. For our Analyst Program, NIBC is looking for universitygraduates who share our pursuit of professionalism. Personaland professional development are the key-elements ofthe Program: in-company training in co-operation withthe Amsterdam Institute of Finance; working side-by-sidewith professionals at all levels and in every financial disciplineis part of learning on the job. We employ top talent from diverse university backgrounds,ranging from economics and business administration, tolaw and technology. If you have just graduated, withabove-average grades, and think you belong to thatexceptional class of top talent, apply today. Joining NIBC’sAnalyst Program might be the most important careerdecision you ever make!

Want to know more? Surf to www.careeratnibc.com.

Interested? Please contact us: NIBC Human Resources, Frouke Röben, [email protected]. For further information see www.careeratnibc.com. NIBC is a Dutch bank that offers integrated solutions to mid-market clients in the Benelux and Germany. We believe ambition, teamwork, and professionalism are important assets in everything we do.

NIBC adv. Professionalism A4 10-08-2009


24 gameTry to make 24 out of the numbers displayed in figure 3. You are only allowed to use the following operations: +, -, : and x. The numbers are: 1, 3, 4, and 6.

grasslandfarmer René owns a piece of grassland and three animals: a cow, a goat, and a goose.

René discovered the following:• If the cow and the goat graze on the field together, then there is no grass left after 45 days. • If the goat and the goose graze on the field together, then there is no grass left after 90 days. • If the cow and the goose graze on the field together, then there is no grass left after 60 days. • If the cow grazes on the field alone, then there is no grass left after 90 days.

1) Assume a fixed amount of grass at the beginning. 2) Assume that the cow, the goat, and the goose eat grass with a constant speed. 3) Assume that the grass grows with a constant speed.

for how long can the three animals graze on the field together?

ClockLast week, an error was made with a clock at Tilburg University. The clock was set on 6 o’clock just before the beginning of a lecture. However, an alert student noticed that the hour hand and minute hand had been interchanged and attached to the wrong axes. This resulted in the hour hand moving with a speed twelve times higher than the minute hand. When the clock maker arrived, something remarkable happened: on the moment he inspected the clock, it showed exactly the correct time again. If you know that the clock started at 6 o’clock in the correct position, then what was the first moment that it showed the right time again?

MatchesIn figure 4, a dustpan (with a small match on it) is constructed by using four matches. Replace two large matches in order to put the small match out of the dustpan.

Please send your solutions to the puzzles to [email protected] before 1 June 2010. The previous puzzle, Pi Scrabble, was solved by many readers. However, we received the best solution from Menno taanman. He can pick up a crate of beer or a cake (Dutch: vlaai) at the Asset | econometrics room. for the winner of this contest, the same prize will be waiting. Good luck! |

F i g u r e 4 : D u s t p a n

F i g u r e 3 : 2 4 G a m e

Je leert meer... ...als je niet voor de grootste kiest.

Wie graag goed wil leren zeilen, kan twee dingen

doen. Je kunt aan boord stappen van een groot zeilschip

en alles leren over een bepaald onderdeel, zoals de stand

van het grootzeil. Of je kiest voor een catamaran, waarop

je zelf de koers bepaalt en jouw ontwikkeling direct van

invloed is op de snelheid van je boot. Zo werkt

het ook met een startfunctie bij SNS REAAL, de

innovatieve en snelgroeiende dienstverlener in bankieren

en verzekeren. Waar je als starter bij een hele grote

organisatie vaak een vaste plek krijgt met speci eke

werkzaamheden, kun je je aan boord bij SNS REAAL in de

volle breedte van onze organisatie ontwikkelen. Dat geldt

voor onze nanciële, commerciële en IT-functies, maar

net zo goed voor onze traineeships waarin je diverse

functies bij verschillende afdelingen vervult. Waardoor je

meer ervaring opdoet, meer leert en sneller groeit.

SNS REAAL is met een balanstotaal van € 129 miljard en

zo’n 7.700 medewerkers groot genoeg voor jouw ambities

en klein genoeg voor een persoonlijk contact.

Ambitieuze en ondernemende starters op hbo-

en wo-niveau bieden we naast een afwisselende functie

een uitstekend salaris en goede doorgroeimogelijkheden.

Aan jou de keuze: laat je de koers van je carrière door

anderen bepalen of sta je liever zelf aan het roer? Kijk voor

meer informatie over de startfuncties en traineeships van

SNS REAAL op www.werkenbijsnsreaal.nl.

Starters

third edition, march 2010

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