well since somebody brought it up...didn't another person who I won't name, but who is a recent vendor on this board also get fined for a similar matter? so if people are gonna point out worldco, maybe other people should get pointed out too. and Don as far as breaking the law arguement...I've worked at 2 of the bigest firms in the world and I'm sure you know how long the list of fines are for them
Within the next 3 weeks or so, I will launch a serious assault on one of our competitors, GENERIC TRADING, LLC. I have done extensive research regarding their operation in New York, and I believe I can easily beat anything they offer their trader by 0.2 cent per share, with 10-20% additional payout to boot. This is, to put it plainly, the most vulnerable firm I have seen by far, as our firm simply has way too many advantages over it, and a hostile take over of some of its talents is a nice warm up for me. I have no idea why their traders haven't looked for an alternative. Some of them are under golden cuff contracts, but that contract could be expiring soon. I will make a serious BID for their service, as they deserve nothing but the best of the best deal there is. Some of their team leaders definitely overcharged their traders, and even if I do fail in my attempt to acquire their talents, it will force them to offer more competitive rates. I believe quite a few of them are uninformed, they don't know the existence of a firm like Worldco, and my job is to send the message across, tell them exactly what I have to offer.
Hitman, Please correct me if I am wrong, but I have been reading you journals over the past few months and I was thinking that maybe your time would be better spent working on yourself instead of working on "assaulting" your competition. I've said it before and I'll say it again, any individual that feels a need to seek out a better deal is able to walk into any firm's office and ask for info. They don't need to have a major assault launched on them and may even find that to be offensive. Before you get upset at my comments let me say that in reading your journals last year you obviously have the skill and desire to do well in this business and last years results were exceptional to say the least. But, is it not possible that maybe the problem is NOT the market but yourself. After all, if the problem truly is that the market is very difficult these days, you have no chance of improving things since it is out of your control. The biggest enemy that we as traders face is ourselves not the competing firm next door. I am not generally one to offer advise and I don't know you personally but from an outsiders point of view I must say that it is probably better to forget about the pis*ing contest and get back to the business of enjoying trading regardless of which firm (Echo, Bright, Worldco are any other) you choose to join. Spend your time working on finding the winning edge that you already know you have. The competition will take care of themselves and if word gets out about this amazing trader at Worldco who consistently turns a profit, maybe people will come knocking on your door asking you to help them learn to trade....and if they don't that's ok too. Some people, but not everybody, wants to trade at Worldco. DarynC
FACT: If I never took on the leadership position, I am sure my own trading will be better. (That said, now with the commission reduction, it is a toss-up) FACT: I always wanted to expose myself toward the management aspect of business. And I was willing to suffer any slumps that are usually associated with the distractions. FACT: If I am meant to be a great individual talent, I will fulfill both. I will build a successful trading team AND make myself a successful trader. The problem is at this point, my learning curve is already flat. It is no longer a situation where I can just pile in many many hours and expect to see something in return. It is very difficult for me to learn anything that will improve my trading substantially, and for me to reach the next level, I have to play the same games over and over and over and over again while trying to push up my size and holding time up little by little. It is like saying "if I can jump just one another inch higher I will be able to dunk the basketball", but you just can't do it. I know what I must do to get to that very important next level, but I haven't done it yet and I don't know how I can possibly speed it up. And it is going to be a long ride until either: 1) Everything suddenly just clicked, which is exactly how I turned profitable. I can not describe it, it just clicked, you can make up a million reasons how you made the progress, but what really happened was just that, everything clicked. For me to make out into that next level, something has to click, again. 2) Someone who is substantially better than me comes along and fights in the trench with me on a daily basis, talks about every trade he makes (not just the winners) and allows me to pick his brain not just on strategy but also execution (like when to pare in and out and such). Neither is under my control seriously, I go into every game and try to play my best, that is under my control, when can I break out into that next statistical category, I don't know. I do know a lot of traders, including one that I just picked up from within my own firm, are paying high rates than they should. Simply because they don't know better. I mean, if Worldco offered me 2 cents a share to start, 50% payout, I would have still took it anyway simply because I didn't know the industry. So I am going to let the game come to me, but make myself come to the competitors.
Don, In Economic Theory, many "intagibles" not dealt with classical Economic Theory are thrown under the heading of a "tax." For example, you may recall when many corporations were overpoluting, there was a talk of a pollution "tax." [The companies either broke the law or lost to the competition] Companies could even buy polution "rights" from each other, and pollution rights may even be traded in a commodities exchange. The "taxes" then collected could be used to clean the environment, etc. There are many more examples of monetizing something of [moral] value to us. I am not suggesting that this is what Hitman meant or what you were taking exception to, only that in the world of money and Monetization in particular, usually we want the world to fit our models, not modify our models to fit the world. Hitman clearly functions in a warrior like [a la "The Art Of War"] mode where the rules are those of Economic Theory. Nothing "wrong" with either point of view, just gotta know which rules you are playing by. nitro
What you are saying makes sense to me, sort of. The big difference is that when you first experience success as a new trader (we both started trading at prop firms around the same time I believe), you think "wow! I can do this". I think that where some people start to fall apart (in terms of profitability) is when they they start to think "I'm going to do this" (ie. force things to happen). It may seem like a contradiction but I believe that it's ok the go into each day thinking, I'm going to make $xxx today or I'm going to trade the best that I know how. However, at the same time we can't force trades to happen. There is no sense thinking, "I'm going to beat the market today" because it can't be beat. The best you can do is just go along with it. And if today you're in tune with the market, you should come out with a profit. I'm not saying that you personally do any of the things above, but what about if instead of trying to win the game, you just play the game instead? Get rid of the pressure to win, forget the stats for a while, stop keeping score, JUST PLAY. I'm not trying to be critical here, just offering up my thoughts for consideration. What do you think? My philosophy is that it doesn't have to be a battle every day, but if you want to make it one, at least go with the flow. DarynC
Thats a rather low blow Don. You of all people should know how often security firms gets fined by the SEC, even the big boys like Morgan and Merrill pay their dues every now and then. No need to resort to these sort of tactics just because you feel threatened by Worldco.
DarynC Nice post. I agree completely. Just about every time I go into the day thinking "I'm gonna make big bucks today" I end up with my tail between my legs.
I've got to agree with hitman on this one....sometimes the agencies are on witch hunts and honest people get caught in the trap. i think it was massachusetts that the atty general's office wanted to make a name for themselves by going after Block Trading and for good reason and unfortunately Bright got singled out at the same time for not being registered in the state. and if memory serves me correctly there was trouble with a bright trader in chicago that was on one of those 20/20 type shows a couple of years ago. in both cases i would side with Bright but if you guys thought it was best to just pay the fine, who here could blame you. so i think we should give worldco the benefit of the doubt here.......but if i were considering them as a potential firm i would do my research. anyway, if anything i have said is inaccurate please let me know.