Black Gold Rush
Article :
June/July 2007
It will go down in history as one of the all-time great trading paydays. Now, as the dust settles on the NYMEX’s initial public offering, we reveal who won, who lost — and why one of the last great bastions of open-outcry will never be the same.
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Fast Market
Article :
Feb/March 2007
Coffee trader John Connolly conquered the NYBOT pits but never abandoned his passion for auto racing. Burning the midnight tires with a man on a mission — for speed
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Traders of the Corn
Article :
August/September 2006
The Maharishi's followers brought Wall Street -- and Golden Domes -- to small-town Iowa. But can they really make the market levitate just by meditating?
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Buy-Side Behemoth
Article :
April/May 2005
Running $1 million can be tricky. Running $1 billion is even trickier. State Street's European head trader, Douglas Hampton, chats about what it's like to run $1 trillion
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Ego Check
Article :
February/March 2005
Simon Brown learned the hard way that it's not about him -- it'ss about making money
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The Player
Article :
February/March 2006
Chicago equities trader Bobby Schwartz had proven his mettle on the floor of the CME when he set his sights on Tinseltown. But would steering a hit through Hollywood's shark-infested waters prove too tough for even a titan of the pits?
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Scaling Profits
Article :
December 2005/January 2006
Mead Welles drums up success for his two Octave hedge funds by applying theories he learned as a musician.
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This Bull's Life
Article :
December 2005/January 2006
Buzzy Schwartz's remarkably successful career as an independent trader has known no boundaries -- and he’s still going strong.
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Larry Williams's Last Stand
Article :
October/November 2005
For the past five years, legendary trader Larry Williams has speculated $1 million before legions of pie-eyed disciples. Now he's pulling up the tent stakes on his seven-figure show. We snuck in to see what happens when a trading slugger takes his final cuts.
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Nick Leeson Comes Clean
Article :
October/November 2005
A decade after his legendary fraud destroyed a financial institution, the greatest cautionary tale in the history of trading is alive, well -- and not all that contrite. The man who redefined "rogue trader" sits down to tell his side of the story
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The Whistleblower
Article :
June/July 2005
But did Bob Stellato do the right thing -- or merely do himself in?
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Against All Odds
Article :
June/July 2005
Turning the AMEX around might require Lou Gerstner, Eddie Lampert and Superman. The exchange is counting on Neal Wolkoff. Here, he talks about the road ahead
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Silverado
Article :
June/July 2005
Some crafty Peruvian policymakers and a most precious commodity -- common sense -- helped me slay the silver market
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John Henry's Double Play
Article :
April/May 2005
A self-taught mathematical discipline earned John Henry a place in Trader Monthly's Hall of Fame. That same trading philosophy brought generations of Boston baseball fans something Ted Williams, Carl Yastrzemski and Jim Rice never could
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Beef Stew
Article :
April/May 2005
It seemed like nothing could stop stampeding cattle futures a few years ago. Nothing, that is, except a little mad-cow disease
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Sling Trade
Article :
April/May 2005
Self-proclaimed "Risk Doctor" Charles Cottle claims that his "slingshot hedge" is the best prescription for pain-free trading
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Balls Out
Article :
April/May 2005
Growing up, Ray Fischer's life revolved around soccer. Now his dedication to chasing a ball around a huge field is paying dividends on the trading floor
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Jungle Boogie
Article :
April/May 2005
Snake hunter Bryan Stuart gets medieval on killer cobras
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Flipping Out
Article :
February/March 2005
Is Paul Rotter a devious market machinator or a victim of his own success? The biggest trader on the Eurex and the most controversial man in electronic trading speaks out
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The Lifer
Article :
February/March 2005
Michael Pascuma, 95, the world's oldest living trader, has outlasted Babe Ruth, Black Thursday, the Great Depression, the Cold War, 13 U.S. presidents, 9/11 and more than 20,000 opening bells
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Paired Up
Article :
February/March 2005
One of Bright Trading's brightest stars sheds some light on his aggressive pairs-trading strategy
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Bubble Boy
Article :
February/March 2005
Coming of age in the dot-com frenzy in the late '90s meant getting slapped with enough comeuppance to last a lifetime. Here's a taste of my humble pie
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The Sultan of Short
Article :
February/March 2005
During the 1980s, Matt Feshbach struck fear into the hearts of book-cooking companies everywhere -- and helped revolutionize both short-selling and hedge-fund trading
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Flirting With Disaster
Article :
February/March 2005
As a trader of cat bonds, John DeCaro wrestles with Mother Nature herself on a daily basis
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Burning Man
Article :
February/March 2005
Jim Bellar routinely goes whoop-ass on Arizona's worst wildfires
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The Headmaster
Article :
December 2004/January 2005
Steven Schonfeld has shared his epic trading wisdom with hundreds of followers -- and made a fortune along the way
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The Elephant in the Room
Article :
December 2004/January 2005
T. Rowe Price's head trader, Andy Brooks, uses every weapon in his arsenal to keep from becoming the Street's prey
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The Spoils of War
Article :
December 2004/January 2005
In January 1991, the United States entered an armed conflict for the first time in a long time. How the Gulf War - and dumb luck - netted me $300,000 in one trade
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Shipshape
Article :
December 2004/January 2005
Competitive sailing helps Harborside's Michael Cashel process information fast
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Fire in the Hole
Article :
December 2004/January 2005
Circus geek Wilbert Behn turns up the heat -- and gets jiggy with the big cats
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The King of T-Bonds
Article :
October/November 2004
For Tom Baldwin, who traded roughly $1 billion of treasuries each hour, a $2 million profit was just another day at the office
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Cracking The Code
Article :
October/November 2004
Charles Chen has made millions mixing big single-trade bets, market timing and a dose of Da Vinci Code numerology voodoo. Trading only indices, he's up 82 percent over the past two years
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Day of the Hunter
Article :
October/November 2004
How a talking head, a half-dead deer and a rusty pay phone helped net me a few million
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Nonstop Trading
Article :
October/November 2004
Mike Donahue has turned the Sydney office of TransMarket Group into a round-the-clock money machine
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Risky Business
Article :
October/November 2004
Skyscraper jockey Tom Silliman on fear, danger and close calls
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The Business of Burnett
Article :
July 2008
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Head Butler -- Books: The Spies of Warsaw
Posting :
Jesse Kornbluth
:
07/18/2008
The "spy" is "an ordinary-looking man, who led a rather ordinary life" -- he's a mid-level engineer at a German ironworks, married, with three children. But as he takes the train to Warsaw in the autumn of 1937, his leather satchel contains some engineering diagrams. Once in Warsaw, he'll give them to his contact.
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Callan to Join Credit Suisse
Article :
July 2008
Erin Callan, whose rise and fall at Lehman Brothers transfixed Wall Street, has resigned to join Credit Suisse.
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Friday Levity: Like Father, Like Son?
Article :
July 2008
As George Soros reprises his trading prowess and continues to push forward his various political causes, his son Alex parties with hangers-on in the Hamptons. But for any hedge funds seeking out the genes of one of the best traders of all time, the son is available, as apparently his Facebook profile lists him as "unemployed."
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Goldman Star Defects to GLG
Article :
July 2008
Goldman’s Driss Ben-Brahim, a former member of our Trader 100 who dropped off the list this year with his fellow bank peers, now has his superb chance to get back on the list. Like a powerhouse football team spending big to fill the void of a lost superstar, GLG is poaching Ben-Brahim after emerging markets trader Greg Coffey announced he would leave the firm earlier this year.
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Summer Showdown
Article :
June 2008
After enduring a brutalizing market session that left many of them pummeled, 16 Wall Street traders took out their frustrations in the ring as part of the Trader Monthly's Wall Street Boxing Summer Showdown, presented by Milus watches, the Solaria Riverdale, and Del Frisco's. Thankfully for T3 Capital's Jay Neu, who skipped yesterday to get ready for his fight, he did not disappoint his bosses in the front row after losing in last year's inaugural Trader Monthly event.
> read more
Trading Disaster Headlines
Posting :
Raymond Lee
:
06/23/2008
Floods in the USA, Typhoons in the Philippines, and earthquakes/floods in China being presently prominent in the news, a review of Andrew Busch's book is timely.
> read more
Chris Cox Gets Ears Boxed
Article :
June 2008
The chairman of the Securities Exchange Commission is getting a bit of the Beethoven’s father from critics, as word spills out that while every other bigwig up and down the U.S. regulatory circuit dialed into the Bear-Stearns-is-screwed conference call, Cox hit the snooze button. Or so suggests The Wall Street Journal’s classic excoriation today. (Of course, it gives voice to Cox’s defenders, but only very weakly.)
> read more
Summer Showdown
Article :
June 2008
> read more
London Challenges France – Again
Article :
June 2008
This time, it’s in the form of dueling rogue traders. While Old Blighty can’t hold a candle to the amount of coin lost in Paris earlier this year, it seems it can certainly give it a run for its money when it comes to bad timing.
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Indictment Excitement
Article :
June 2008
Federal prosecutors have been very busy. First, leveling the long arm of the law at Swiss bank UBS for improperly valuing its holdings (possibly) and now taking aim at two former hedge fund managers at Bear Stearns whose fall from grace last year marked the beginning of the subprime crisis (though, we are pretty sure, did not cause it). In the wake of the collapse of two Bear hedge funds run by Ralph Cioffi and Matthew Tannin that cost investors roughly $1.6 billion, could criminal charges be filed as soon as this week? A bit on the downside of being a trader.
> read more
Trader Spurs International Manhunt
Article :
June 2008
Once in awhile – though admittedly more often on Wall Street than anywhere else – a story comes along that’s so bizarre (yes, in that Henry T. Nicholas III kind of way) and so utterly appalling that even we have to rub our eyes a few times before we can finish reading it. This is just such a tale: the unspeakable getaway (or suicide) of one Samuel Israel III (apparently, the numeral III in names being an early indicator of future freakishness) the co-founder of defunct hedge-fund Bayou Management, who left his SUV on New York’s hulking Bear Mountain Bridge with the words “suicide is painless” traced in dust across the hood…on his way to reporting to a 20-year prison sentence.
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Speaking of Insider Trading...
Article :
June 2008
"I know the guy... who knows the guy... whose brother-in-law works with the accountant who's crunching the numbers on a deal, who was college roommate's with the lawyer who drew up the contract. It’s a sure thing!" Many of us have heard the connect-the-dots of a merger at the bar or at a weekend barbeque (probably from your brother-in-law) about a pending deal that you have to get in on. But as the number of defendants rises in insider trading cases, chances are you know the guy who knows the guy who works at the SEC too.
> read more
Big Brown, Black Mark
Article :
May 2008
> read more
Into the Light
Article :
May 2008
Like many of his hedge fund brethren, Chris Hohn is said to be notoriously reclusive. But the man behind The Children's Investment Fund has been enjoying something of a coming out party of late.
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Tales Of A ‘Hedge Fund Hippie’
Article :
May 2008
Think you know Arpad Busson, 44-year-old financier, chairman of hedge-fund outfit EIM and boyfriend to Hollywood actress Uma Thurman? Think again. True or false: Did he or did he not turn his first profit selling toothpicks door-to-door? Did he date former Charlie’s Angel Farrah Fawcett? Did he masquerade as an Italian prince on the French Rivièra? The answers to all this and much, much more are just a voyeuristic click away.
> read more
Stable Platform
Article :
June/July 2008
The golf shoe already good enough for the most exacting man in the game has just gotten better.
> read more
LIFE LONG EARNING POTENTIAL
Posting :
Trading
:
05/16/2008
> read more
Hedge Fund Regulation: Messier Than Ever
Article :
May 2008
The Financial Times has a crack today at this increasingly complicated subject. What is clear is that there’s no shortage of Nervous Nellies looking to pull the reins on traders, as pension funds and other more conventional types pour cash their into just about anything (their fault, we’d say). But we wonder if all this fussing won’t ultimately keep hedge funds from being able to freely experiment (with the blessings of their investors, of course). And if that happens, wouldn’t it negate the whole point of the thing?
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It Figures
Article :
May 2008
Though it’s still too early for hedge-fund honchos to celebrate, the top winners so far this year seem to be some of the funds that suffered the most excruciating losses in the summer of 2007. An inspiring look at those who have so far managed to bounce back after being torn asunder.
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Great Drake
Article :
May 2008
After a vote of no confidence from its investors – in the form of a flurry of redemptions totaling $1 billion – Drake Management has decided to wind down its $2.5 billion flagship fund. Still, if anyone wants to keep on sending its traders checks, they have an address where you can send them. Their follow-on fund.
> read more
The Citadel Poacheroo
Article :
April 2008
What, exactly, is behind all of Citadel’s high-profile hires – including its latest nailing of J.P. Morgan senior manager Derek Kaufman, most recently head of the bank’s fixed income department in its proprietary-positioning group?
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A Head Rolls In Paris
Article :
April 2008
Remember how Société Générale’s CEO Daniel Bouton offered his resignation just after the news broke of the bank’s so-called rogue trader Jerome Kerviel and his billions of losses? – And the board rejected it? Well, on second thought, they’d like to take that back...
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Another one trying to get into trading
Posting :
Trading
:
04/02/2008
Colleged educated, securities licenses, private currency trader, and trying to get into trading for a living.
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Trader Monthly 100: 51-60
Article :
April/May 2008
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Trader Monthly 100: 41-50
Article :
April/May 2008
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Trader Monthly 100: 11-20
Article :
April/May 2008
Behold, the traders ranked Nos. 11 to 20 on this year's list.
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Goldman Renders Unto Caesar
Article :
March 2008
And since Goldman is ostensibly Caesar, what we’re really trying to say here is that it’s rendering unto itself...In this case, to the tune of close to $2 billion, or 90% of the amount it sank into its failing hedge funds last summer. The bank isn’t the only one pulling out, though. There’s also a certain U.S. billionaire investor now headed for the door.
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The Trader Monthly 100
Article :
April/May 2008
They're called hedgehogs and fat cats, and sometimes much worse than that. We present them simply as “traders,” though in truth most are technically considered portfolio managers. There’s one word, however, that definitively describes each of the securities-industry standouts who make up this year’s Trader Monthly 100: flush.
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BlackRock Tapped By Bear, Fed
Article :
March 2008
For what started out as a modest bond shop, Lawrence Fink’s firm is doing pretty darn well: in the past year it’s caught the eye of not only Citigroup, JPMorgan, Bank of America and the U.S. Treasury Department, but, more recently, Bear Stearns and the Fed, which have given it $30 billion to manage on top of its already formidable $1.4 trillion AUM.
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Even Curiouser
Article :
March 2008
Police have nabbed another Societe Generale employee in connection with the Kerviel Kerfuffle... Mysteriously, the suspect’s name, which once graced the so-called rogue trader’s Facebook page, has been released several times online in the last 24 hours. And then duly erased.
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Second Société Générale Trader Arrested
Article :
March 2008
French financial police searched Société Générale's trading room Wednesday and took into custody a male employee from the bank's cash equity trading department. According to The International Herald Tribune, the police are questioning Manuel Zabraniecki, who joined Société Générale's equity sales desk in October 2006, and who was one of 11 people originally listed as friends of Jerome Kerviel on his personal profile on the Facebook social networking site.
> read more
Market Volatility: You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet
Article :
March 2008
Geez, folks, I hate to sound like a broken record, particularly when I have nothing to offer but another regurgitated blog bite about how sucky things are, but I feel that I should go on record to say that this is a VERY dangerous tape.
The trends discussed in the last edition of the Left Tail Report are still by and large in place, which means that I don't see any hope for a sustained rally, until both: a) There is full disclosure of losses in the financial sector; and b) The market has squeezed every last bit of rate cutting out of the Federales that is humanly possible.
> read more
The Economic Malaise That Dare Not Speak Its Name
Article :
March 2008
Unless the person talking is Warren Buffett and someone from CNBC is pointing a camera at him. The Seer of Omaha definitely uttered the R-word yesterday, eliciting gasps across the nation, and making clear that, at least in his mind, there is no doubt anymore as to what is happening in the U.S. That said, the situation is nowhere near as frightful as a few others he might – and did – mention.
> read more
Bear: Still Under The Gun
Article :
February 2008
A criminal investigation that’s progressing into the implosion of two hedge funds at one of Wall Street’s top banks could hinge on whether the funds' managers misled investors during a conference call last spring about the dire straits they faced. But in uncertain times, exactly what is a bank to say about a fund’s prospects for survival to investors?
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Citi: Barring The Door
Article :
February 2008
Banks and hedge funds are not making for very good bedfellows lately. While the eye-popping returns of hedgies earlier this decade prompted institutions to flock to the more promising funds like gummy teenage girls to a Poison concert, the party looks like it’s pretty much over as investors pull rank on weak returns. To the list of banks that have recently been burned by a string of redemptions (UBS, Goldman, et all) add Citigroup, which has just slammed the door on clients trying to pull out of its CSO Partners fund. So, exactly what took the bloom off this rose? And what might Citi’s CEO have to do with it?
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The Thing About Those Hidden Risks
Article :
February 2008
They tend not to announce themselves, do they? How mixing your bank-related debt investments with bank-related insurance purchases came come back to bite you when you dance with too many partners. Think of it as leaving yourself open to a risk-profile STD.
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The Kerviel Diaries
Article :
February 2008
For those easily offended, read no further (though, for the record, this was in today’s Financial Times and there was no such warning appended). For those rarely offended, unoffendable (or easily offended, yet still strangely able to arrest umbrage for the sake of peeking at someone else’s instant messages – in this case, those of one very infamous trader) read on for a look at the man whose language is, colloquially, rather less innocent than the “aw shucks” demeanor pervading his statements so far to the press.
> read more
Watch List
Article :
February/March 2008
Taken your share of profits this year from the black-gold market? Then celebrate by strapping a hunk of red gold on your wrist.
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A Leg-Up?
Article :
January 2008
A $1 trillion Baltimore money-management firm has searched for a successor for years – and now it has found one. But has he arrived in time to turn the firm around?
> read more
Surviving Your Gazillions
Article :
January 2008
Congratulations: You just made a king’s ransom on that awesome bet everyone said you’d never win. From now on, it’s easy street for you, right? Wrong. In truth, you might as well have just painted a giant red bull’s eye on your chest. If you ever felt persecuted before, it’s nothing compared to what you are about to go through now: People will want to know every aspect of how you came into your riches and, of course, whether there’s any chance they might take them away from you. The public will not rest until it has its answers and the press won’t rest until the public rests. The good news is, there’s a way to play this game. You just need to know the rules.
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‘I Always Knew It Was A Bad Idea To Let Kids Run Global Finance’
Article :
January 2008
Too late. Here, a summation of the reactions and overreactions coming out of Davos as news of the $7 billion-ish trading loss generated by The Rogue Trader of SocGen continues to rock the financial cognoscenti.
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No Need To Be A Partisan To Enjoy The Presidential Primaries
Posting :
Rod David
:
01/10/2008
You don't have to be partisan in order for these early Presidential primaries to interest you. So long as big money is watching developments among the campaigns - and acting or reacting on the news - it pays to try forming some sort of opinion to filter the news ourselves.
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Head Butler - Books - "Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic" by Tom Holland
Posting :
Jesse Kornbluth
:
01/04/2008
Is America Rome?
> read more
That Other Merrill Savior
Article :
December 2007
OK, it’s quiz time. When Singapore’s state-run Temasek Holdings invested $6.2 billion in Merrill earlier this week, which mutual-funds manager played a supporting role as its right-hand man? Can’t guess? Here’s a hint: It’s the same firm that’s now throwing its cash into yet another high-profile, if ailing, financial stock.
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Stock Doc: The Markets Dishing Out “Humble Pie” To Investors
Posting :
Dr. Alden Cass
:
12/26/2007
> read more
2008 Boxers' Profiles
>
http://www.traderdaily.com/boxing/profile.html
Wisdom Of The Crowds
Article :
December 2007
Do you believe that, overall, the guesswork of the peanut-munching hoards tends to point to the right answer? We don’t, either. That’s a lie, we totally do. (Or we hope so, given that our most current and evolved strategy is to pick our bets by dartboard.) Either way, a major force on the Web is now putting this thesis to the test.
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Money Is Costly, But Souls Come Cheap
Article :
December 2007
Blaine Lourd got rich picking stocks. But then he realized that everything he thought he knew about the markets was dead wrong.
Like a lot of people who end up on Wall Street, Blaine Lourd just sort of stumbled into it.
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Citadel: Bail Bonds Here
Article :
November 2007
Given that Citadel is fast becoming Wall Street’s Buyer and Lender of Last Resort, we wouldn’t be surprised if it’s also in talks with the proprietors of the Treasury-backed “superfund.” For now, however, it’s content to pitch in with the salvage effort of ETrade. So, since we well know the Chicago hedge fund’s no charity – what’s in it for them?
> read more
