Biography
Yiyang Zhang is a Fourth-year Ph.D. candidate in Finance at the Scheller College of Business, Georgia Institute of Technology, advised by Dr. Alex Hsu and Dr. Xindi He. His research lies at the intersection of empirical asset pricing and the options market, with a particular focus on the activities of institutional investors and on behavioral mechanisms that shape asset prices.
Prior to Georgia Tech, Yiyang earned two master’s degrees from the University of Michigan — an M.S. in Applied Statistics and an M.F.E. in Quantitative Finance and Risk Management — both completed in 2023. He received his B.S. in Economics from Lingnan College, Sun Yat-sen University in 2020, where he was one of seven students awarded the International Mathematical Class Certification, graduating with honors.
Outside of research, Yiyang served as captain of the Lingnan College table tennis team in 2018 and 2019, leading the team to its strongest performance in history.
Download my resumé.
- Option Market
- Asset Pricing
- Institutional Investors
- Behavioral Finance
- Artificial Intelligence
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Ph.D. Candidate in Finance, now
Georgia Institute of Technology
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MSc in Applied Statistics, 2023
University of Michigan
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MFE in Quantitative Finance and Risk Management, 2023
University of Michigan
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Bachelor of Science in Economics with International Mathematical Class Certification (Graduate Honor), 2020
Sun Yat-sen University
Recent Publications
Notes
Code and Data
Accomplishments
Competitions Results:
- Optiver Realized Volatility Prediction: Silver Medal
- G-Research Crypto Forecasting: Silver Medal
- LLM Prompt Recovery: Silver Medal
Experience
Working Experience & Internship Experience
Responsibilities include:
- Help the research on multiple projects, topics including risk perception, event jump, machine learning and deep learning, and the linkage between personality and company strategies.
Responsibilities include:
- Teaching Assistant for MGT 4070 International Finance (Undergraduate Section) and MGT 6070 International Finance (MBA section) in Fall 2023 and 2024.
- Teaching Assistant for MGT 4068 Fixed Income (Undergraduate Section) in Spring 2025.
- Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant Award for the Scheller College of Business in the Year 2024.
Responsibilities include:
- Research on a quantitative trading strategy based on the return skewness of the commodity futures. Use multiple methods in volatility control and portfolio optimization to improve the strategy’s performance.
- Build hedging models for the quantitative trading system.
- Research on the compile method for the commodity future indices.
Responsibilities include:
- Calculate and analyze the CDS return and replicate algorithms based on provided papers.
- Prepare and Calculate the multi-factor data for the stock market.
Responsibilities include:
- Edit Open-sourced quantitative trading software and build required functions for cryptocurrency trading.
- Research and build quantitative trading strategies for cryptocurrency and corresponding futures.
Responsibilities include:
- Do the data mining and statistical analysis on city investment bonds.
- Research portfolio optimization algorithm and use deep learning techniques to improve the trading strategy.
Responsibilities include:
- Researched the quantitative strategy of quantitative sub-funds of FOF investment and conducted quantitative sub-fund investment feasibility analysis and evaluation.
- Successfully developed a stock index arbitrage trading strategy and an alpha strategy based on Equity-bond yield difference.
Responsibilities include:
- Did the financial modeling and cash flow forecast for the company’s investment projects and assisted in making feasibility analysis reports.
Responsibilities include:
- Participated in the business plan analysis and research of the startup companies and built the single-store profitability financial model for profit forecasting.
- Conducted fundamental analysis and financial analysis of select U.S. and Chinese companies.
Responsibilities include:
- Do financial analysis under instruction for selected H share stocks and help to write the analysis report.