I think the value of education in trading is all hype. You can just have street smarts and make cash in trading. I also believe that education is simply a form of acceptance, and its necessity from a functional point of view is largly determined by the individual. You don't need that shit to do "the job". You could probably learn anything you needed to know on your own. Wanna be a doctor...yeah, do that shit at home. Wanna be a math prof? Learn math and start "professing" to people on the street. Thats right. Education is bullshit. In fact, you ever see those ass clowns running in the subways playing their little violin? o, its sounds pretty good for raw retarded talent. They can bust out some destiney's child on the violin just from ear? Yeah...you can't teach that now can you? Its about as bad the the little fiddler from DMB....o yeah, he's REAL good isn't he? I'm sure he'll solo at carnegie... But you know, he might have learned how to play the shit right had he made it to an elite music conservatory....but hey fuck that because education is bullshit....he's good chomping away his horsehairs on that poor little instrument. I'm sure you can find a similar analogy to trading. But you know, for every math/physics prof in the making, there was Einstein. And for every DMB fiddler, there were founders of any first principle....like a Mozart. but if the elite train intelligent people right, you get a nice product. Too bad there aren't enough elite trading firms with elite indviduals to trade intelligent people. Until then, you can just count on hoping to be the next Mozart....busting away destiney's child in the subway for change and not even knowing how to read fucking sheet music and worst off, BEING PROUD OF IT.
kamdooo, But didn't on this page you claim education was the end all be all? And everyone else was a loser? And now your reversing your position?? Very odd. ============================ http://elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=42143&perpage=6&pagenumber=7 "show me your profit/loss" Why would any trader care? This isn't trading in a white shoe ivory tower. This is trading that is completely open to uneducated and potentially incompetent individuals. The bottom line is that most traders looking at these firms are just not going to cut it, and they aren't all that educated to begin with. So who cares? If you don't get into an institutional sales role at a place like Goldman or can't make the exotic derivatives desk in a BB because you can't do quant and don't have the mandatory Ph.D. in Physics or Applied Mathematics (at bare minimum math fin masters), then what do you expect? Those guys are doing fine, earning a salary between 400k-1 mill, and they all have Ph.D.'s in something quant; good for them. A place like Assent, EchoTrade, and every other similar shop isn't anything like a Mako or optiver. You're going to be surrounded by incompetent, uneducated people who have accomplished very little in comparison to the snobby little I-banking analyst, and the extremely educated Econophysics geek working at a BB's quantitative trading desk. Of course theres going to be more loss than profit. These places are all lower tier with respect to selectiveness and prestige. You will always have more losers in an environment that does not select the very best. In speaking with Mr. Quinto from Altea, he mentioned some exceptional traders were golf and tennis players that played at the professional level, meaning they made money from it. I know school isn't everything. But then again, neither is athletics. However, coming from a selective university, or being a great athlete is about being a winner. You may have known someone who you thought was "bright" but didn't do well trading (trust me, they weren't on their way to publishing one of their brilliant essays in a reputable journal). So what? Going to Stanford is a sign of a winner. Being a great college athlete is a sign of a winner. Getting into anything were the barriers to entry are stiff like a BB bank {name you're department} is being a winner. Working for a prop firm is not reserved for the elite. Its a place for losers, in every sense of the word: in terms of money, status, and prestige. There might be a minority of winners, but thats exactly it, a select few. Knowing this, and asking for a P&L is absurd; of course everyone is losing; its a place for losers. (hopefully you think you'll be a winner in a pack of losers) Most winners don't go to unsalaried prop shops, plain and simple."
kamdoo, And I quote you again below http://elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=42143&perpage=6&pagenumber=9 Are you REVERSING your position on EDUCATION now?? ============================ "in response, i) I'm interviewing right now. Never been in a prop firm trading. ii) its a business venture. Freedom; its great in any form. I agree with you on all points. My point is that people who knock a person's education and have this backwards sense of pride in coming from the "school of hard knocks" make as little sense as people who believe that pedigree of any sort (school, major, certifications) will bring success in an environment where performance counts. [performance doesn't count as a monkey analyst in a BB i-bank. It counts in sales, real estate-- compensation based jobs] Crass, arrogant individuals lean so heavily one way or another. Its annoying when you hear a cocky uneducated prick talk about how education doesn't mean squat. I just want to know if these {you fill in the blank...its someone who has a love of not knowing shit} have ever seen quant job postings and the salaries that go with them; i'll take a 500k-1mil non bonus salary. Its also annoying when a little turd that doesn't know the difference between what an IQ score indicates about a person vs. an SAT starts bragging about how he's "smart". Smart is a talent, like height. Knowledge is not a talent, its earned. It's annoying when somebody talks about how they scored a perfect on the GRE math...who gives a shit? All it means is that you watched fewer episodes of Seinfeld that week than the guy who scored a 700. Excessive pride in either side of the pedigree/street smarts dichotomy is simply annoying for me, and I suspect many readers of this board as well. Now I ask you to give a little insight I rarely see here. You have been trading for a while. You're either good, or good enough to stay in it. You must have seen people who are the former. Question: Do you know of a currently profitable trader that either did not put in a lot of effort, or is currently not putting forth much effort?"
i'd actually like to quote myself from another thread entitled something like "investment banking advice-how to poop on someones apple pie"...but why bother. Does education matter for arcade trading? No. And nobody at this site can give me one good reason why one would even need to formally attend an educational service. (save reading, writing, ect....) Sure it might help...but many here would say that is doubtful. In fact, most everyone here believes that it wouldn't. Maybe some psychology, but we can all admit thats a bull#$## degree that doesn't really count as an "education" as much as my life experience counting rocks. (its not respected as a field, period. Ironically, its apparently the most useful discipline here. Some use math. Some use cs. We here at elitetrader think trading is more psych than anything else....how ironic.)