someone posted on the website with the "chart" (?) of S.G. rouge trader P+L a comment I found interesting -Here's some soul searching for you: the trading geniuses who decided to dump the whole thing in one day, let alone a US holiday, shouldn't be allowed anywhere near a trading desk.- easy to comment when it is not "your firms money at stake"
I was under the impression that he wasn't a bad trader. That he stumbled mainly because he was burdened with hiding the big gain. Obviously it was not the case especially when you look at his performance earlier in the year. It seems like he had no concept of a stop loss. In addition he held too long, when they found out he was down but had said he thought he could recover. Probably thought he could double down. What the hay, it's not his money.
SG took several days with only a senior trader to unwind the position. If you accept the fact that the unwinding was NOT the catalyst for the market tumble in January than it was a good idea that they liquidated.
You were under the impression that he wasn't a bad trader? Sheah man, if you assume that the P&L graph is authentic, the guy is swinging from the trees well before the right royal phuck up in the end. This guy was a punter, no other way around it.
There was really no details about his early positions just that he did research and felt subprime was gonna take the market down. I assumed he had the same idea that GS had and had bet in the same direction. But that mid-year drawdown is sick. A lot of guys who were trading their own money would have capitulated.
According to the given P&L, he was around 2.7Billion Euro in the Red in Oct was he not? Thats a pretty wild swing to get back in the Black at around 1.5Billion Euro. Unbelievable SocGen didn't know and/or do anything about the October drawdown!
Who could had losses in March, april and may 2007? I suspect this guy is a permabear. And he got squeezed.