The Treasure HunterQ: How much longer before you began to take positions?
A: As I mentioned earlier, I started as a clerk and then it took
about 9 or 10 months before I got into the ring, and I started
trading a company account. I was so excited by that. You go into
broker training for about a month before you’re going into the ring.
Part of your day is spent on the phones taking orders, but the other
part is to go over to the pit that you’re going to be trading in and
observe for an hour every other day or so. Then maybe twice a
week you have classes after the markets are all closed. You go into
the pit that you’re going to be trading in and they do simulated
trading and teach you how to do open outcry, which is really a fun
and a thrilling process, and how to quickly get your mind ready to
execute orders and multiple orders when the markets are falling
and rising—also how to cross trades and execute buy and sell orders
at the same time. So that was really thrilling, and I was really loud
and vocal in it, and so was everyone else. Then, when it comes
to your first day in the trading pit you see every newbie, who was
very loud in training, is basically standing there with their arms
crossed. Except for me of course, I had to go wild. I start yelling
and screaming and making markets and doing trades. I remember
one of the other newbies from the class looked over to me during
the second or third day in the pit. He was like, “What the hell
are you doing, do you know exactly what you’re doing, yet?” I was
like, “No, but I’m just trying to react to the order flow.” Then low
and behold that relaxed feeling paid off because in my first month
trading open outcry, I made$40,000, and I thought okay, now it’s
going to happen. I’m going to be the next George Soros, this is how
it’s going to start.
Q: The reason it happened was because you were just reacting
to order flow? That is you were basically fading the offers, buying
the bids and the market was relatively quiet so you were able to
make the spread?
A: It was a little bit different then, the market was pretty busy. So
I was fading orders, market making, scalping in and out, and when