I can spell, just cannot type for shit P.S. I edited the post to fix the typo in case people missed it lol.
Thanx, I think we owe it to our incredible profession to show society how wonderful trading can be--we've gotten a bad rap with all the big blowups, murders, fraud and ridiculous industry regulations that prevent us from detailing our great or even small successes--I aim to change that. On a lighter note, I offered to double or even triple the award if they let me call it "The Timothy Sykes Award For Students Who Learn Good" (in praise of Zoolander), but apparently not everyone likes to make fools of themselves in front of large groups of people. Oh well--this year we awarded it to this girl who builds big ass wooden boats from scratch, cool stuff: http://www2.tulane.edu/article_news_details.cfm?ArticleID=7384
So how many employees do you have running/trading for the fund while you do your tour? and i'm not bashing you. I'm quite impressed by your success/profitable venture.
There are few who can. Guys like Douglas who can't really trade made their money writing books about psychology for investors. I'd say Elder is a good example of one who can. I don't follow him because I invest in small caps and am not really a trader, but his methodology is great and he wrote it very articulately in a few books. Writing a retrospective is completely different though to writing a guide to methodology. No offense to Tim, but if his fund is doing as terribly as others have said, he might be more of a writer and less of a trader/investor.
Hey Timothy. Congrats on the show, book, etc. One thing I always wondered while watching you on WSW was: Considering your trading style -- chart watching & daytrading microcaps -- you must've been limited in terms of how much capital you could've employed with that strategy. I mean, I can't imagine committing more than a few hundred thousand (and that's pushing it!) per trade. And, since your trades were based on chart watching, I would think you were limited to a handful of stocks to trade at any one time. Considering that you'd made $2m on your own during college, that sounded like more than enough money to daytrade microcaps. Just how big did you think your fund could get using that strategy while still delivering decent returns to investors? On another note, I do tend to agree a little with nx on his comments regarding the CNBC show. It's no diss on you, because the "lightning round" format prevents you from elaborating on your stock picks. But, I personally think the Million Dollar Challenge is a joke not meant for real traders, and so, unfortunately, anyone who appears on a program to help people pick stocks for that competition risks having his reputation diminished.
no one could chisel the frost off that ice queen also: who hit the curb in the merc? hah i laughed at that
Well other than a few interns, I'm really the only employee of the fund so I'm working on this right now. Yes, there's a fine line between a retrospective and a methodology book. My favorite book of all-time is Reminiscences of a Stock Operator so I'm going for a modern day version of that--more of an inspirational/educational story rather than specific formulas that probly won't be very helpful since the market environment is constantly changing. Thanx for the note--microcaps are surprisingly liquid when they are in play (see HOKU, JSDA, YTBL) so when I first started my fund, scalability was a concern, but I thought I could handle at least $20-$40mm. Oh, how naive I was. If nothing else, my book will teach people that, due to present industry regulations, it is extremely difficult to raise significant amounts of capital quickly if you don't have the right connections. The CNBC Model segment was a total mess--they appeared with only a few minutes to go before the show ended and Melissa Francis was definitely not a big fan, so much of what occurred was improvised--welcome to the world of live TV.
BTW, if you are a Tulane alumni, you can still win my award--its open to everybody who's ever studied, taught, or worked there. It would be nice if somebody from the trading world wrote a good enough essay to actually win one of the years. All it takes is to prove to the committee that you are passionate about your unusual talent/profession.