Almost every day you can find in media commentary that XYZ is causing stocks to fall (or rise). Such definitive statements are common—but what’s almost always missing is statistical proof. And if you ...

Suppose estimates are available for correlations between pairs of variables but that the matrix of correlation estimates is not positive definite. In various applications, having a valid correlation ...

In the first case, there is a strong upward-sloping relationship between X and Y; in the second case, no apparent relationship; in the third case, a strong downward-sloping relationship. Note the ...

Mitchell Grant is a self-taught investor with over 5 years of experience as a financial trader. He is a financial content strategist and creative content editor. Timothy Li is a consultant, accountant ...

The Statistical & Data Sciences (SDS) Program links faculty and students from across the college interested in learning things from data. At Smith, students learn statistics by doing—class time ...

Investopedia contributors come from a range of backgrounds, and over 25 years there have been thousands of expert writers and editors who have contributed. David Kindness is a Certified Public ...