The Coolest Guy in the Roomthink I learned from experience that the best thing to do is to try
and get back to even over a little bit at time. It’s a whole easier to
make a half point on 100 contracts than it is to make 10 points on
10 contracts.
Q: What was the most interesting part of this job?
A: You know, people would think that the answer would be
making a lot of money or the short work day. But that’s not it at all.
Winning the game is really important to me. Working with some
good traders is important to me. The rest of the things take care of
themselves. If people get into business because they think it’s easy,
they’re kidding themselves. It’s the toughest game in the world.
And trading for an hour and half or two hours a day is probably far
more work than the average person puts in their eight hour office
job. It is very, very tough. It’s tough emotionally. But I liked to
try and teach people to succeed and learn to do this, knowing very
well that only 1 in 10 are going to make it.
Q: What about drudgery? Is there anything unpleasant about
his job?
A: No. I look forward to it everyday.
Q: The wide array of trading that you’ve done over the last six
or seven years, what would you say was the most humbling trading
experience for you? The one that really taught you the most?
A: [Laughter.] I don’t know. I think I probably learned far more
from trying to teach new traders to trade than anything that I did
myself. One of the things that I’m sure you know—I’ve realized
that all new traders are going to go through some experiences that
are similar. They will have some dumb luck. They will triumph and