I'm posting in this subforum although it's highly specialized in options since my experience with options forum is that it's mostly formed by amateurs. So going for professionals this time Please evaluate the following proposal. Feel free to comment in public or reach me in private. ========================= a) The target Development of a systematic (quantitative) options trading system. - Optimistic scenario: the system beats the market and scales up, recovering the investment costs and making the associates rich. - Pessimistic scenario: the experience generated (knowledge and code) gives enough kick to associates careers so at least they recover the investment costs. b) The audience Experienced options traders / quants / developers. All three combined, that is. Importantly: you can be experienced without being successful. Successful individuals need not apply (and make sarcastic comments! The purpose of this association is precisely correcting the "anomaly" (if you can call a 99% occurence - the ratio of experienced to successful - an anomaly). b) The time frame 2 years. c) The investment $15,000 for development costs and $20,000 in trading capital. d) The system 4 associates. By random drawing, one of them will work full time for a payment of $30,000 / year (which includes his own contribution of $7500). All four contribute indispensably, with knowledge and work. I'm employed full time so the amount of time is limited, I assume target audience has about the same situation. The sum is calibrated for a decent life in Eastern Europe but any location goes as long as it meets the low cost bar. Remember, the purpose is to make money by the product (trading system), not by the means (salary). ========================= This association would only fit highly entrepreneurial types who at the same time are close enough to success so that sharing their proprietary and long-researched knowledge can give the whole system "escape velocity". By themselves they might never make it, but together they stand a fair chance.
Having been on Elite Trader since a few years now, I know better than to hope I'm actually gonna get an associate here. Remember the famous quote "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." What I do find reasonable to expect though is polishing this "pitch" to the point the message is crystal clear, in the shortest count of words. Afterwards I'm gonna take it to other places and see how it goes there.
You asked for eastern european pay. You're going to get slammed for posting an insultingly low base pay with extremely high risk. So let me start: Good monday laughs. Anyone with the competency you asked for can go work for a hedge fund for 5x that, with potential trade upside. A developer with that competency alone will command at least $200/hr for the specialized skills on the consultant market. If you had bigger AUM you might be able to convince one to work for $100/hr. What value add are you providing over anyone else? Developers with these skill sets are in high demand - what makes you think anyone would want to work with your idea? A developer with a decent day job can produce your starting capital + salary by themselves in 4 months of living on beans and rice. You're the beggar here. Remember that. I get offers like these twice a month because I'm a consultant, and apparently people think that means I'm an idiot. It's always the same story - unlimited upside because the idea can't fail. I just need you, the guy who will build it, to work like a slave for a pittance. When it doesn't work, I'll abandon you and walk with the rest - sorry! You're not being an entrepreneur, you're trying to rip someone off. Take what I say seriously, and ask yourself what you are even providing to a developer who can command 120k+ just by existing. The answer is virtually nothing - especially given the skill set you want. Your "experience play" in the pessimistic scenario is basically the trope every start up uses to sucker new developers into giving up good development years under experienced guidance.
You lost it when you mentioned you work full time and have limited time. And you look for unsuccessful people? And then, you look for others to introduce their IP? What value do you exactly add other than being a huge risk factor for everyone else? (you want upfront investments but promise annual salaries or returns that may or may not ever occur) I am too tired and lazy to think, what is your catch here or what is even your point?
Your messsage is impossible to be less clear to be honest. What are you bringing to the table? How do you mitigate the risk that you won't take a walk with all the others' investments? Why should anyone with IP want to share it with others? Why would anyone without IP be seen as a valuable teammate by those who do bring something to the table? Your pitch makes zero sense to be honest.
I enjoyed reading the responses from the other 2 folks lol... I was literally speechless.. this idea so merit-less I didn't know where to start lol.
Do you really think a true Professional is going to consider anything you have written in the original post? I'm flying in a developer this week at the cost of $250/hr and then all expenses, flight, meals, hotel, transportation for 3 days. This individual has done excellent work for me in the past. The only folks that are going to respond to your request are going to be amateurs and only a gullible lost soul would send you a dime for such a project. Also you can't guarantee any success or making one rich from options trading, or any kind of trading.
For what it's worth I generally charge around $200/hr for contract work. I will bill lighter on tech im unfamiliar with, or a project I have some buy-in on, but I never drop below $125/hr. in this regard and the lower-paid contracts tend to be time boxed so I can return to better paying contracts sooner (these are primarily clientele building exercises and being generous sometimes pays off a ton in the future). I'm very familiar in this space and even on the lowest end OP would not be able to find a competent junior developer in any stack for less than $80/hr without significant effort in nearshoring/offshoring the work - but like all things there a TON of sacrifices in this regard. Especially regarding professionalism. His requirement that the person be competent and professional as a developer, but also experienced enough in trading to have their own systems, demands significantly more capital because there's probably only a handful of people who have this ability that would be able to work on it - none the less in the presence of an NDA/Non-Compete (to all the developers reading: never sign a non-compete. You do not need the money that bad). This is about on par with my experiences in the development industry (not in the trading industry - I rarely get contracts for systems dev/data architecture), so you seem to be getting a fair price for a developer in the field. Paying $250/hr. plus flight and expenses is very generous of you, and I'm sure you'll keep your talent around a long time.