Fun fact about Ed Thrope is that it's pretty likely he derived the correct formula for pricing options a decade before Black/Scholes/Merton. Unlike them though,

Fun fact about Ed Thrope is that it's pretty likely he derived the correct formula for pricing options a decade before Black/Scholes/Merton. Unlike them though, he kept it to himself so it wouldn't dilute his edge in the market. The latter would of course publish their work and go on to win the Nobel Prize in economics. So, Ed Thorpe basically gave up the Nobel Prize to make a shitton of money instead.