We have to share the sad news that Prof. Dr. Thorsten Rheinländer has passed away, unexpectedly, in October 2025. He will be remembered as a kind-hearted colleague, dedicated teacher, and for his seminal research contributions to mathematical finance.
Dr. Rheinländer commenced his academic journey in mathematics and theoretical physics at the University of Göttingen. Subsequently, he relocated to the TU Berlin to complete his Diploma under the esteemed supervision of Martin Schweizer in 1996. Approximately three years later, he successfully defended his doctoral dissertation titled “Optimal Martingale Measures and their Application in Mathematical Finance,” guided by Martin Schweizer, Hans Föllmer, and Christophe Stricker.
From 2000 to 2004, Dr. Rheinländer held positions as a member of Freddy Delbaen’s Chair of Mathematical Finance at ETH Zürich. Initially, he served as a Credit Suisse Research Fellow, and subsequently, he assumed the role of an assistant professor specializing in risk management. In 2004, he relocated to the London School of Economics (LSE) to assume the position of a lecturer in statistics. Subsequently, he was promoted to the rank of reader and concurrently served as the program director of the MSc in Risk & Stochastics. Dr. Rheinländer was appointed as a full professor at TU Wien in 2012. However, his longstanding affiliations with the research group FAM (Financial and Actuarial Mathematics) at TU Wien date back at least a decade earlier.
Prof. Rheinländer devoted his scientific career to the advancement of mathematical finance and insurance mathematics, fields in which he combined exceptional analytical depth with intellectual elegance. Trained in stochastic analysis, he developed a distinctive research style characterized by mathematical precision and conceptual clarity. His contributions to the theory of stochastic finance — particularly in the areas of utility indifference pricing, markets with stochastic volatility, and martingale measures of minimal entropy — are noted for their depth and sophistication. These works provided fundamental insights into valuation and hedging under uncertainty, influencing both theoretical developments and applied approaches in quantitative finance. Beyond his research, Prof. Rheinländer was a dedicated academic leader and teacher. At the London School of Economics, he played a central role in shaping and directing the MSc programme in Risk and Stochastics, where his expertise and pedagogical clarity inspired generations of students. Earlier, at ETH Zürich, he was instrumental in driving the ETH contribution to the Swiss NCCR project in finance, demonstrating his commitment to collaborative and interdisciplinary research.
His book Hedging Derivatives (coauthored by Jenny Sexton) stands as a lasting testimony to his scholarly rigour and ability to bridge the gap between complex mathematical theory and its financial applications. The quality, depth, and lasting impact of his publications have earned him high respect in the international community of stochastic finance.
Colleagues and students alike will remember him for his sharp mathematical insight, his quiet authority, and his unwavering dedication to intellectual integrity and education.
Uwe Schmock, Stefan Gerhold, Julia Eisenberg