Markowitz

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A surname borne by an American economist who pioneered modern portfolio theory and shared the 1990 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics
2. The family name of a United States economist celebrated for founding modern portfolio theory and winning the 1990 Nobel prize in economics
3. Denotes an American economic theorist, a Nobel laureate best known for developing the mathematics of diversifying investment portfolios

Etymology: "Markowitz" is a Jewish surname, and as a common noun it is best understood as a nickname for the economist Harry Markowitz, who won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1990 for his work on portfolio theory. The surname itself is a variant of "Markovich" and "Markowicz", forms that describe a son or descendant of someone called Marko, a Slavic personal name derived from Mark. The Slavic patronymic ending "-ovich" or Polish "-owicz" was Germanized into "-owitz", a shape common among Ashkenazi Jewish families whose names were recorded in German-speaking lands. Because the family name was carried by a man whose ideas became central to modern finance, the name itself came to stand for his field in shorthand. Its origin lies in a Slavic first name, not in economics, and the surname's journey from a Slavic patronymic through German spelling to an American economist is typical of many Jewish family names of the period.