Generating random numbers with specific stats in Excel

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supersharpshooter

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I’d like to generate random numbers with specific skewness, kurtosis, mean and standard deviation in Excel. Is there an easy way to do this? Does anyone happen to have a script handy?
 
in general, the moments do not determine the distribution uniquely. even if you know all of the (infinitely many) moments, let alone only the first 4 moments, that doesn’t specify the distribution. so basically you can have many different distributions that have the same mean, variance, skeweness, and kurtosis - your question is way too general i think to have an answer
 
Pseudorandom, dude. Pseudorandom. As long as you’re using an Excel/VBA routine there’s no way you can effectively generate random numbers, regardless of the distribution.
 
To some extent, you can simulate kurtosis with an inverse t distribution with few degrees of freedom. Not sure how to get you skew, though.
 
For some reason I can’t read Maratikus’s link, so not sure if I’m repeating anything here.
A common general technique for moment matching is the Edgeworth expansion. A while ago I found an Excel implementation on the web; a bit of googling might track it down for you.
 
dukatu2 Wrote:
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> =RANDBETWEEN(m,n)
1) you are making an assumption that the distribution is uniform, it needs not be
2) m,n only parametrize first 2 moments, what about skewness and kurtosis
 
DarienHacker Wrote:
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> A common general technique for moment matching is
> the Edgeworth expansion. A while ago I found an
> Excel implementation on the web; a bit of googling
> might track it down for you.
thats a great suggestion, but again, you need to make an assumption about what the distribution is. you can expand the edgeworth series for the normal and match the first 4 moments, or you can match the first 4 terms of the edgeworth expansion for lognormal, exponential, whatever
 
for a random number in general, ask Mobius Striptease: “what is 1+1?”
 
nuppal Wrote:
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> Or ask Jeffries Analyst about their bonus.
Jefferies (spelled incorrectly) bashing on AF. Love it. Who says the 2007 attitude is dead?
 
NakedPuts Wrote:
——————————————————-
> nuppal Wrote:
> ————————————————–
> —–
> > Or ask Jeffries Analyst about their bonus.
>
> Jefferies (spelled incorrectly) bashing on AF.
> Love it. Who says the 2007 attitude is dead?
This place is turning into WSO anyway…
 
dukatu2 Wrote:
——————————————————-
> =RANDBETWEEN(m,n)
^ this is how our accountants set the yearly budget.
 
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