Learn to author cash-flow models in CFDL
Built for finance professionals and technical modelers alike: a core track that teaches the language through the deals it describes, and deep-dive chapters for readers who want the machinery underneath. Every example runs in your browser against the real engine.
Begins with Why a language? — no install required.
Curriculum
Read the parts in order — each chapter builds only on material already introduced. Chapters marked as deep dives can be skipped on the core track.
Part I
3 chaptersThinking in cash flows
Why a modeling language beats a spreadsheet for auditable deals, the object model — time, entities, streams — and how to read what a run gives you back.
Start Part IPart II
13 chaptersThe core language
Streams, schedules, expressions, assumptions, curves, fields, events, options, waterfalls, and Monte Carlo — the full packless language, one construct at a time, each with runnable exercises.
- Streams and schedules
- Expressions
- Assumptions and inputs
- Curves
- Fields and recurrence
- Growth, ramps, and guards
- Events and options
- Waterfalls
- Cash, state, and the machine
- Uncertainty and Monte Carlo
- Multi-file models and style
- Under the hooddeep dive
- Diagnostics as a disciplinedeep dive
Part III
4 chaptersModeling judgment
The decisions the syntax cannot make for you: choosing grain, choosing constructs, the finance semantics the language encodes, and when a domain pack earns its keep.
Start Part IIIPart IV
5 chaptersThe CRE capstone
One development deal carried end to end — skeleton, revenue, costs and financing, exit and returns, then scenarios, Monte Carlo, and an equity waterfall over the whole structure.
- The capstone: Harbor Point
- Capstone: revenue
- Capstone: costs and financing
- Capstone: exit and returns
- Capstone: risk and the split
Part V
3 chaptersReference
The language on two pages, every CRE contract type with its terms, and notes for teaching the course.
- Appendix A: language quick reference
- Appendix B: CRE pack term tables
- Appendix C: instructor notesdeep dive
The course kit
Every exercise in the course as plain files — starters, prompts, run configurations, and solutions — for classroom use or offline work with the command-line tools. Rebuilt from the course sources on every deploy.