Hi All! I recently read through the Market Wizard as the forum suggests in "Education". It's truely a great book for trading newbie. In the book, one of the interviewed traders took the job as a stock brokerage agent before becoming a floor trader. What do you guys think about the current prospect of stock brokerage agent? Does it help you promote yourself to be more sophisticated in trading? Great Thanks!
Generally, no it won't help. As a stock broker you are a salesman. You will generally be treated as such by the trading industry as most brokers only know what their firms tell them as far as market outlook, etc. They are usually on a much longer time frame than traders as well. Its a brutal job if you don't like sales. You will be making cold calls for at least a year. There is a reason why it is so easy to get these jobs.
That is exactly what it is - sales. In fact, one such firm here in Chicago that shall go nameless called me multiple times trying to get me to come in and interview for such as position even after I heard them out and declined interest. I would decline and a month later they would call me again to see if I was still interested and even at times acting like we never spoke. It is all sales and no market activity. You also have to push products and 'upsell' and 'cross sell' a suite of financial products that may not even be in the interest of your client all to meet sales quotas. Unless you want to prospect and cold call stay away from these types of jobs as there is nothing trading related about them.
If you wanted to learn how to repair automobile transmissions, would you take a job as a car salesman? Nuff said!
Anyone can get these jobs, there are no education/background requirement, just salesmanship. If you can sell your clients on load mutual funds, variable annuities, expensive insurance products, and have them trade through you directly as a "broker" rather than trading on their own with E-Trade you will make a million dollars a year. So if that's for you, then go for it. I'm currently involved in trading and for awhile got inquiries on a weekly basis for "Financial Planner," "High Net Worth Client Administrator," "Financial Services Representative," "Financial Products Representative", type jobs, and really they are all the same thing...Broker jobs. I said, "No thanks."
Right on with the Boiler Room suggestion... If you are an independent thinker, do your own analyses, and like to actively watch your investments on a day to day basis and trade, then this is not a job for you. It's more focused on long term relationships with mostly jaded but wealthy clients, and convincing them that the "market is long term." You'll probably also get an opportunity to sell inferior in-house mutual funds and conveniently fail to notify your clients that their returns lag the S&P 500 year to year on a regular basis.
Anyone can get these jobs, there are no education/background requirement, just salesmanship. If you can sell your clients on load mutual funds, variable annuities, expensive insurance products, and have them trade through you directly as a "broker" rather than trading on their own with E-Trade you will make a million dollars a year. So if that's for you, then go for it. I'm currently involved in trading and for awhile got inquiries on a weekly basis for "Financial Planner," "High Net Worth Client Administrator," "Financial Services Representative," "Financial Products Representative", type jobs, and really they are all the same thing...Broker jobs. I said, "No thanks."