Stefan Euring’s Post

🔗 Excel, Python and AI for financial modelling - match made in heaven or too complicated for Excel-based analysis? 🤔 In a former post, I argued that Python could enhance your Exel-based financial analysis. Let me be more specific about why this combination makes sense - and address the elephant in the room. 💡 Why extending your financial analysis using Python makes sense The use cases go beyond what traditional Excel can handle efficiently. For example, you can enhance your analysis with: ✅ Advanced visualizations - Interactive charts and data plots that Excel's native charting cannot produce or where the creation is cumbersome and manual ✅ Regression analysis - Automated regression and statistical modeling analysis ✅ Simulations - Complex Monte Carlo simulations with correlated variables and built-in constraints that are hard and impractical to implement in Excel without 3rd party add-ins 🤔 But isn’t that also possible in Excel, at least with VBA? ❌ The Excel and VBA reality check Much of this is possible in native Excel, but it's more manual and time-consuming. VBA can automate the processes. But it feels outdated, Microsoft isn't actively developing it further, the syntax feels clunky, the learning curve is steep and you invest time learning something that doesn't transfer well to other contexts. Overall, I personally did not enjoy the VBA experience when trying to learn the language. 🚀 Python can act as a bridge and future proof your career 🔹 Automation - Python is the language of data science and lends itself well for automating manual tasks in Excel 🔹 AI integration and LLM compatibility - AI works better with Python code than with Excel and most AI tools do their analysis using Python. Being able to read Python code becomes valuable when working with these language models 🔹 Future-proofing - Python skills transfer to data science tasks and to other programming languages in general 🔹 Bridge to automation and full-fledged software - Once you have your analysis in Python code, you can even go further. Using AI tools, you can turn your financial models into interactive web applications and even full-fledged software 👉 You're building a future-proof skillset that opens doors 🎯 The practical approach Start small. Use Python in Excel for one specific use case and get comfortable with the syntax within the familiar Excel environment, using Python in Excel for example. Let AI help you and check the results against your excel results. You can gradually expand your Python knowledge and replace manual analysis step by step. 📢 In my next post, I will dive into some of the use cases and explain when it even makes sense to transfer your entire financial analysis into python. Stay tuned for more 📻 #FinancialModelling #Python #Excel #DataScience #VBA #CareerDevelopment #AI #FutureSkills #Automation

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Curious to see the use cases you’ll share, Stefan!

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Future belongs to AI and automation. Completely depending upon excel will make one outdated and AI integration within modelling is a must

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