Millionaire TradersQ: What about your parents, any feedback from your parents on
starting this up?
A : They’ve always been really supportive—probably more
shocked than anything. But they weren’t really scared that I was
going into hock and might lose everything. They thought it would
be a good time to try it as well.
Q: You have a$40,000 grub stake. You have$25,000 in the bank
for expenses. You’re living on the couch and you walk into a trading
firm in Chicago, what happens then?
A: Oh it was horrible [laughter]. I went to interview at all these
different shops and pretty much went with the one that didn’t
charge a seat fee. The shop I chose claimed they gave some good
training before you started trading. So I thought great because
I know nothing. I knew a little about fundamental and technical
analysis from college, but not enough to be a professional trader. So
I was hungry to learn, and I was also conservative with my capital.
Some of these seat fees were$500 to$1,000 bucks a month, which
I thought was just crazy. In hindsight, I probably would have been
better off going through a different shop that charged a fee.
Q:Why?
A : Because the shop I ended up going to had so many IT
problems.
Q: So execution was terrible. You were not able sometimes to
get in and out of positions because the computers went down?
A: Oh yeah, it was just misery. I mean [laughter] the worst place
to come in. The traders there were more swing-oriented, I think,