Yes, Gabriel, He Must Be

Over on another blog, Gabriel Mihalache tries to cast doubt on econophysics:

"If Doyne Farmer thinks that there are systematic, exploitable, opportunities for profit... then he must be a very rich man, right?"

I turn to the Web site of the Prediction Company, where I find:

"Founded in 1991 by Doyne Farmer, Norman Packard and Jim McGill, Prediction Company quickly set out to take the financial world by storm. Based on their earlier work in chaos theory and complex systems Drs. Packard and Farmer felt the financial markets were an example of a highly complex system that would be amenable to predictive technology. They assembled a team of world class scientists and engineers to attack the problem.

In 1992 Prediction Company signed an exclusive five year deal to provide predictive signals and automated trading systems to O'Connor and Associates, a highly successful Chicago based derivatives trading firm. In 1994 O'Connor was purchased by Swiss Bank, one of the world's largest banks. Swiss Bank extended the exclusive relationship with Prediction Company for another two years. In 1998 Swiss bank and UBS merged to create the world's third largest financial institution. Prediction Company continues its ground breaking work with UBS AG, and in November, 2005, became a wholly-owned subsidiary of UBS AG."