Do you tell people you're a trader?

I never get a good response.


trend

 

Venture Capitalist, little or no questions on this one. When pushed I say it's complicated.

 

The only truthful response on this entire thread.

 

I think the problem is that we are trading INDEPENDENTLY..
if we trade for merrill lynch or a bank or a well-known
fund, I don't think we will have problems with this question at all.

When I tell people I trade for living, the next question is usually
which firm do I work at, then I have to tell them I trade at home,
and you can immediatly tell the disappointment on their face and
they change the subject ( well..I try to change the subject most the time).

As independent traders, our social identity( and ranking) is the same as being unemployed, trading is definitely not a job and MOST people don't think of it as a business, it's natural and convinient for others to put you in the "unemployed, loser, " catogory with all its associated attributes, which is why we are all so very insecure about what we do no matter how money we make. this also explain why we feel compelled to engage in conspicous consumption(nice cars, clothes) to regain our social status..

 

Trader = professinal gambler

My response is Private fund manager, since I trade other peoples money as well as my own ... then I bullshit them with some Option pricing theory, they soon drift off... little do they know I trade on yesterdays High, Low and the open and 3 spins of a coin!

 

large homes work the best for social status. cars and clothes are trinkets.

 

i like these answers best:

dlincke
Senior Member

Registered: Oct 1999
Posts: 238

08-10-01 02:07 AM

I sometimes answer that question by telling people that I'm a "critical liquidity provider". It's always funny to see people get really confused while pretending to know what that is.

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candletrader
Elite Member

Registered: Jun 2001
Posts: 3106


08-11-01 09:53 PM

Tell them that you are "engaged in probabilistic net excess return generation via the real-time analysis of intraday valuation evolution". That will either win em over or send em to sleep. Either way, you'll get em off your case.

 

Its hard for people not in the business to understand what trading for yourself is all about. Unless I am prepared for a lengthy conversation, I just say I'm a clerk.

 

what year was that in? i was that annoying guy in front of the brothel begging for a spare copper."shine you sandals for ya governor" sheep and slave futures back then wiped me out.