One last question: how secure are YOU my friend? I'm my own boss so I don't have to watch out for the axe. You, on the other hand, are working for a firm that is bleeding profits like a stuck pig, willing to give Eliot Spitzer a handjob if he would just let them keep the precious right to screw their clients...ever wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, wondering if there might be a pink slip on your desk in the morning?
pink slip ? I take it in a heartbeat.... plus the payoff that comes with it. i'd have another job within a week.... once you've got the experience and the contacts, Wall St. becomes like musical chairs.
as the responses to your question so aptly indicate, succesful traders come from all backgrounds, socioeconomic strata, and education levels. i suggest checking out jack schwager's "market wizards" series for an excellent synopsis of the diversity of winning market players. surf
But musical chairs has a nasty kicker: the chairs keep getting taken away one by one, and with every chair that goes, another hotshot hits the bricks. Nothin' personal, I hope you make the cut. Takes all types to make the world go round.
I'm about halfway through the original Market Wizards. It is by far the best book on trading that I have ever read (I've read 7 total).
I don't know why people feel it necessary to attack people with top school degrees. Every member's post I read that even hints at a decent educational background gets reamed. Ivy League grads pretty much deserve every thing they get...I mean, they are seriously hard working folk...and I have no animosity or jealousy towards them. While we were out partying and fooling around back in high school, these guys were actually focused on their futures...studying hard. I agree with the other dude...most daytraders do not own degrees from fine schools...Obviously Ivy League grads do REALLY well on Wall Street and jealousy will stem from that. No one likes to feel inferior in terms of intelligence, but that's life.
EGO has a lot to do with trading. The greatest traders of all time were EGO-maniacs. EGO = Huge Balls : necessary to make it big.
There is a thin line between arrogance and confidence... EGO maniac = huge balls - the humility to accept when wrong and surrender to the will of market... The greatest traders were not ego manics and quite frankly that is a pretty sill statement in my humble opinion... At the risk of coming off pretty arrogant myself, you obviously do not trade or are very new to the game so I will tell you this... If you think being an EGO MANIAC is a plus in this game you are sadly mistaken and I would strongly urge you to extinguish that beliefe beforeyou blow up... PEACE and good trading, Commisso
Hmm... Very interesting discussion. Every once in a while, a discussion of this type pops up on this board. Here's my background and personal take on this thing. Yes, I did go to the a top east coast Ivy League school, class valedictorian in hs, won tons of nantioanl competition, got offers by GS when I got out(should have taken it! doh!), worked for MER , then went on the buyside for a while being a quant money manager. Now, I'm trying this prop trading/daytrading thing. And here's what I got to say: 1) The tons of educations/learning that I accumulated doesn't count for jackshit in trading! 2) I mean in some vague way, understanding abouts odds/stats help you understand if a strategy is viable,etc. but you don't need an Ivy League degree to understand that or have an intuitive feel of odds and risk. 3) Trading is more psychological than anything. And I think a hs dropout with the right "emotional makeup" can probably do pretty well. Now, given these I have to put that following caveats: 1) Yes, an institutional job on Wall St or the buyside(hedge fund) is probably the safest way to get a 6 figure income without that much risk besides possiblity of unemployment... 2) And to get a Street job usually requires good educational credentials. But that's just a means to "filter" candidates, not necessarily a reflection of future job performance... 3) Just because a Street guy made more $$ does not necessarily mean he's a "better trader". A lot of trading jobs are not what purist trading called real trading. It's more market-making. Not speculation. But as I said, Wall St. isn't interested in speculation. they want to make a risk-free money as much as often. Only retail investors, buyside firms, and hedge funds by their very nature are invovled in speculation. So, given these facts, I'm still STRUGGLING to grapple with whether I should stick with this proptrading or go back to the institutional world. On the one hand, I LOVE LOVE the freedom of prop trading. But on the other hand, I'm NOT making anywhere even remotely close to what I was compensated before. But maybe over time I'll get to that place where I'll be making the same $$ or perhaps surpass it. The soul-searching question for me is WHEN will that point come? Will it come? To me life is a long journey. The journey is more important than the destination. But one has to make sensible decisions and perhaps even practical ones even if that means less fun or less freedom.. Stattrader, what do you think is my best bet? trader99