discrete choice

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Crashes Without a Cause: Markets as Phase Transitions Crashes Without a Cause: Markets as Phase Transitions
21 min read Keywords:  phase transitions, Ising model, herding, discrete choice, self-organized criticality, Bouchaud, crashes, fat tails, excess volatility

Big market moves often show up with no news to explain them. A hundred-year-old model of magnets shows why. When people copy each other strongly enough, a market can hold two moods at once, and the smallest nudge tips it from one to the other. We build the model from scratch, with pictures, then turn it on markets.