Your thread on the importance of accountability gave me an interesting research idea (Thanks! ) I think it would be a great thing to test empirically. There are some very famous papers (e.g. by Shefrin or Odean) that document the "house money" effect and the "disposition effect" (tendency to cut winner and hold losers) among others. Those papers have quickly become seminal. I think this research would generate a lot of interest. The problem is in the test design. I might be able to get hold of (actually I already sort of have it) some data from a brokerage, but I'm not sure whether I'll be able to figure out who among the account holders that now trade for themselves have traded for others previously... Do you have any suggestions? Thanks again for the idea
Vlad, I don't know if I understand your request completely. If you want specific names from me, then I can't help you. I would not want to give that information. Privacy issues. You might try approaching an exchange or a major clearing company's customer service people and asking if they have any suggestions to help you out. Tell them it's for a research paper. Worth a shot. I have always found these people to be very helpful. Good luck, rs7
Thanks RS7, no, of course I understand that no names can be revealed etc. I was thinking more in terms of maybe some particular characteristics that such traders have that might enable me to try and figure out who among those account holders that I have might have been pros before. Do they list any carreer history on account applications? That might be one way. Thanks again. PS The brokerage data that I mentioned we have here has been obtained by one other PhD. I'll check out more in-deapth what info he has on them some time this week...