I had dinner with a friend of a friend recently, and I spoke to him and his son about what it takes to become a self-employed full-time home-office trader. His son missed the boat on Vet school, and has recently decided to use daddy's money to become a trader. Kid seemed bright, but a bit too naive and warped by mass media, i.e. he said not only Cramer's name a dozen times, but actually referred to Cramerica at one point... His ultimate goal is to start a hedge fund, but for now he's looking for an annual 50% to 75% or more return on Daddy's retirement savings, which is actually a fairly big number (upper 6's, but lower 6's for the first 12mo). When I told them both, after the kid's spiel, that I would give them the best advice anyone could ever give them, they were both fairly heated. "Don't walk away, Run!" I believe were my exact words, I kind of felt like an asshole. I remember when I first got into this career and how everyone was giving me the expert advice of "Don't walk away, Run!" whether they were actually an expert or not, and I remember the "I'll show them" mentality I had at the time. I almost felt bad, but then I recalled how everyone else actually was right, and how hard it was to admit defeat, as well as how long it took me to really start to figure things out. I took the hard path, and thus far I've surpassed even the most surreal expectations of even myself. I thought about that shit long and hard, how much shit I had to crawl through before I came out the other side still smelling like dung... I did at one point almost feel bad, but all I had to do was remind myself of the realities of trading and the failure rate for ventures like theirs, and that was all I needed to relieve my conscience. Not really looking for 20 pages of pie throwing here, just wanted to share my experience. What's your take? Right? Wrong? Both? Keep in mind, neither was really willing to hear my reasoning behind the advice, they just went defensive on me.
You won't know if you can fly without jumping off of the tree... Imagine if all the billionaire traders were exposed to these failed and washed out trader propaganda when they started out. (& there are a lot of them as well.)
I hope he makes it big because it will make the first page of his book more interesting, "Before I began my fund I met this guy at a dinner party who tried to offer me some advice....." As long as he's not under the misconception that it would be easy, then there's nothing wrong with taking on the challenge
Right. You have to learn to lose in order to win, but do it with you own money and not with money you or somesone else can not afford to lose. A lot of traders lose big times because they are not able to lose how they should. They can not accept losing which is a big and important part of this game.
Your opinion is just that. What they do with it is their decision. Did you elaborate to them on why you felt that way?
Are you a successful trader or authoritarian in this field? Can you mentor the kid and point him in the right direction? Would he be interested in such an arrangement or "does he know best himself"? If you are able to you should offer this service, as a friend. If they don't want your help, and think they are better off on their own, then it is not your problem any more. You can always play the "I told you so" card over dinner sometimes in the future... If you are unsuccessful you can tell them what you have experienced, if they want your advice then great, if not it's not your fault anymore.
I cant believe the father was actually foolish enough to even consider giving his son his own retirement money to trade off of!. Knowing my parents, I'd get my ass kicked out of the house for just proposing the idea. :eek: