Shows
Chat With Traders310 · Dr. Efrat Levy - Fingerprinting the Big Players: Inside the Hidden Order FlowDr. Efrat t Levy is a cybersecurity expert with a PhD in Computer Science and AI from Ben-Gurion University—one of Israel’s top tech institutions. After years studying how to detect hackers through side-channel signals, she applied the same logic to trading.
In this conversation, Dr. Levy explains how she uses machine learning to map non-repainting key levels that reveal the hidden order flow—the subtle timing and volume clues that expose the real intent of big players. She shows how correlated markets often move together at these key levels and how that insight helps her trade...
2025-10-301h 36
Chat With TradersWinning Through Losing: When 30% Is EnoughHow a trader from Dallas built consistency—and a simple lifestyle of freedom in Southeast Asia—with a 30% win rate. Diego Ivan Cortes Lopez grew up chasing perfection on the tennis court, where winning came naturally, but it was trading that taught him how to win by losing.
After years of trial, error, and a six-figure setback, studying the methods taught by Oliver Velez, a prominent veteran professional trader, helped him rebuild his approach - focusing on daily support and resistance, clean reversal signals, and asymmetric risk-to-reward. Now trading large-cap stocks from Vietnam on a single 13-inch laptop with unclu...
2025-10-211h 03
Chat With TradersThe Gamer’s Edge: High-Win Scalping in Pre-Market MadnessA former competitive gamer, Mario Dimitroff from Bulgaria got his start on a local trading floor before discovering that the U.S. premarket session best fit his skills. Now trading for a living and doing nothing else, his news-driven, event-based scalping focuses on low-liquidity movers. Leveraging gaming-honed speed and pattern recognition, he quickly decides whether to ride momentum or fade to mean, enters/exits fast, sizes within liquidity, and sustains his edge by cutting losers quickly, avoiding drawdowns, and stacking small consistent wins. In this episode, you’ll hear how Mario turned his competitive gaming instincts into an all-in co...
2025-09-151h 13
Chat With TradersWhen Story, Fundamentals, and Technicals AlignGrowing up in Germany without a financial background, Julian Komar became fascinated by stocks as a teenager. He moved past complex German trading products to concentrate on U.S. equities. Specializing in momentum and growth stocks on the daily timeframe, he blends fundamentals, technicals, and story analysis to uncover opportunities that put him in the best position for high-potential setups and riding powerful trends. As a disciplined breakout trader, he prioritizes risk control, market trends, and intuition gained through decades of experience.
About Julian Komar
Julian is a trader, mentor, and entrepreneur. With over 20 years...
2025-08-201h 30
Chat With TradersWorld Record with Process, Patience, and Prop FirmsFrom academic struggles at SUNY Albany to holding the world record for the largest prop firm payouts—roughly $4.5 million in total, Kyle Ng a.k.a. JadeCap’s journey started out like many aspiring traders. Sparked by a childhood friend's success in forex about 14 years ago, he found his way into the financial markets. Like many traders, he went through the pain, losses and sacrifices and struggles, but at the same time he’s also unlike many traders, slowly building his edge through discipline, risk management, and a long-term mindset.
Over the years, he’s leveraged prop firms to...
2025-07-311h 18
Chat With TradersTrading Earnings Volatility with OptionsErik Smolinski returns to Chat With Traders after his first appearance on episode 272, joining Tessa for a trader-to-trader conversation about the intricacies of options trading, a topic Erik is deeply passionate about. In this episode Erik digs into one of Tessa’s own options strategies, offering thoughtful feedback and sharing his expertise and experience from years in the game. With so many myths floating around about options, their discussion clears up some of the biggest misconceptions and gives listeners a practical perspective on how to approach this trading style.
About Erik Smolinski:
Erik is a Ma...
2025-06-191h 21
Chat With TradersIan Cox - From Stocks to Options to Crypto - New Host Joins CWTIan Cox, new host from Seattle, Washington joins Tessa on Chat With Traders.Trading and investing since the mid-90s, Ian eventually worked his way towards success which afforded him early retirement, financial and time freedom. Of course it wasn't all smooth sailing as you'll learn in this interview. It never is. Passionate about the financial markets, Ian continues to expand his horizons by continuing to stay curious, learn and grow, even as a veteran trader. He currently still trades stocks and options, but Crypto is what really captivates him these days.Learn more about...
2022-10-0346 min
Chat With TradersPublic Service AnnouncementWhat does the future hold for Chat With Traders podcast? An evolution is on the horizon. Full details revealed in this episode—featuring Aaron Fifield and Tessa Dao. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
2022-07-1917 min
Chat With TradersBest of Trading Psychology, Pt. 2As an extension of the previous episode, I present to you the second installment for the ‘Best of Trading Psychology.’ Taken from past episodes of Chat With Traders, this is a compilation of snippets on psychology and mindset—an important topic to highlight, given the psychological aspect can truly make or break many traders.With any of the snippets, if you’d like to hear the full episode, direct links are listed in the show notes at: chatwithtraders.com/200 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
2020-08-071h 12
Chat With TradersBest of Trading Psychology, Pt. 1Much like the recent Best of Risk Management episodes, here is another compilation. Except this time, I’ve compiled the best clips on trading psychology, for you to hear how varying types of traders deal with mindset maters to stay focused and competitive.Again, I dug up way too much from the back catalogue of almost 200-episodes to pack into a single episode, so this is only part one—part two will follow shortly.Besides creating a go-to trading psychology resource, I hope this might also highlight some past episodes that you’ve not yet heard...
2020-07-241h 24
Chat With TradersChristina Qi – Dorm Room Start-Up Defies Odds, Rises as Large-Scale Quant FundIn her early-20’s, after graduating from MIT, Christina Qi and two classmates; Luca Lin and Jonathan Wang—who had collectively been trading futures from a campus dorm room—founded Domeyard. It was 2012, and Domeyard was to be one of the few high frequency trading hedge funds…As Christina states during the interview, “By all means we should have failed,” given the three of them had little trading experience and minimal insight to the hedge fund industry. Not to mention, the three had almost no money, so Domeyard is also one of the few hedge funds that went out and...
2020-07-031h 07
Chat With TradersHaim Ben Ami – Accelerating High-Speed Traders to Higher SpeedsFeaturing on this episode is Haim Ben Ami; CEO of Raft Technologies.Having constructed shortwave radio towers in Chicago, Frankfurt and London, Raft have established ultra-low latency connections between various exchanges, which are leased to algorithmic trading firms who seek a speed advantage.In talking with Haim, we discuss why some firms are prepared to pay big bucks in order to be a few milliseconds quicker than other market participants. Haim also draws comparisons of the various technologies used to transmit data (shortwave, microwave and fibre optic cable), and going beyond the connection, how firms...
2020-06-1951 min
Chat With TradersRyan Trost – My First Year Trading Full-Time...For this third episode in the My First Year Trading Full-Time series, I speak with Ryan Trost. At the time of recording, Ryan had recently crossed 12-months as a junior equities trader at SMB Capital in New York City.Our conversation begins with Ryan speaking to how he was trading the massive intraday ranges of TSLA during it's parabolic run in February.From there we chat about Ryan’s trajectory in life prior to trading, how he landed a seat on a proprietary trading desk, lessons from losing money month after month, how he began to...
2020-06-051h 17
Chat With Traders195: Ilan Israelstam – The Inner Workings of an ETF ManagerIlan Israelstam’s a co-founder of Australian ETF manager BetaShares and a principal at VC firm Apex Capital Partners. Betashares first begun trading in 2010, and currently, it manages approximately $10-billion dollars in assets, across 61 funds—all of which trade on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX).The motive in asking Ilan to be on the podcast was to learn more about how ETF managers operate and to delve into some of the technical aspects of ETFs. In summary, the topics we cover: risks for ETF managers, how ETF managers make money, the necessity of designated market makers, how ‘short’...
2020-05-221h 07
Chat With TradersLiam Vaughan – Bedroom Trader Amasses Fortune, Becomes Prime Suspect of Flash CrashLiam Vaughan is a finance author and senior reporter for Bloomberg.His latest book Flash Crash tells the story of Navinder Singh Sarao, a London trader, living at his parents house, who made ~$70M from his bedroom and was later accused by the U.S. government of playing a role in the 2010 Flash Crash.For anyone unaware, this was a deeply perplexing event in which the U.S. stock market, one afternoon, plunged approximately 9% and then almost completely rebounded, all in the space of just 30-minutes.While Liam speaks on many interesting moments...
2020-05-0854 min
Chat With TradersGreg Newman – Dynamics and Themes Impacting the Global Oil MarketReturning guest, Greg Newman, is a founding partner and the CEO of Onyx Commodities—a London-based proprietary trading firm, prominent in market making of oil derivatives.This episode focuses on recent events pertaining to the global oil market. More specifically, Greg talks through; key themes impacting prices, supply and demand dynamics, why Crude and Brent futures alone aren’t entirely a true reflection of the oil market, how lower prices affect producers and corporates, etc.Given the subject matter, this episode won’t be for everyone—it’s very specific to oil. But if the energy sec...
2020-04-2154 min
Chat With TradersKevin Muir – ‘Whatever It Takes’—How Reserve Banks React to Economic PressureAs we’ve seen making headlines recently, reserve banks around the world have been adding liquidity to the market in an effort to stabilize economies. While some listeners will already understand how reserve banks conduct these operations, I figure there will be others who don’t completely grasp what takes place below the surface…To get clarity on the subject, I kindly asked Kevin Muir to appear on Chat With Traders for a second time and to explain the actions of reserve banks during this market downturn. Because, in my opinion, Kevin has a gift for analyzing and ex...
2020-04-0841 min
Chat With TradersNishant Porbanderwalla – Extreme Volatility—Trading Markets During a Global PandemicThis is an episode to cover the extreme volatility in markets, following the recent outbreak of coronavirus…Joining me is Nishant Porbanderwalla, returning for a second time on Chat With Traders and here to discuss how he’s been navigating through the turmoil of a global pandemic. Nishant is a proprietary equities trader at Kershner Trading Group, with well over a decade of experience behind him.For the purpose of a timestamp, please note this conversation was recorded immediately after the U.S. close 18th March 2020. Learn more about your ad choi...
2020-03-2337 min
Chat With TradersChristian Castillo – My First Year Trading Full-Time...In a recent episode, I mentioned that I'd be doing a few more interviews with less-experienced traders, who begun with $20,000 or more, have completed 12-months of full-time trading and are making a real effort to get better. Here's another one in the series...My guest is Christian Castillo, he resides in California and trades the foreign exchange market using methods of technical analysis. Although Christian is relatively fresh as a trader, he put up—what I would consider to be—a solid first year. He made money 9 of 12-months, and finished 2019 with a profit just shy of $20,000.
2020-03-171h 00
Chat With TradersBest of Risk Management, Pt. 2Welcome back, as we continue from where we left off last time—here's the Best of Risk Management, Pt 2. Again, this is a compilation of highlights from past interviews, all of which are applicable to managing risk and staying in the game.My hopes in compiling this 'best of' episode is that you'll have a go-to reference for anytime your risk controls require attention, as well as drawing your focus to a few episodes that may have gone unnoticed. If you'd like to hear the full interview with any guest featured, you'll find the link in the sh...
2020-02-281h 10
Chat With TradersBest of Risk Management, Pt. 1After sifting through the archive of near-200 episodes, I’ve compiled some of the best bits pertaining to risk management. As there were many bits I deemed fitting for a ‘best of’ episode, it made sense to split the compilation across two parts—this is part one, and part two will follow next (Episode 189).The idea behind creating this compilation, is to reinforce the instrumental role that risk management plays in a traders’ ability to stay in the game. It can also serve as a go-to reference for anytime you find trading loses getting out of hand.One o...
2020-02-1255 min
Chat With TradersJosh Evans – My First Year Trading Full-Time...I recently had an idea, I thought it may be an interesting exercise to have a few less-experienced traders on the show. On Twitter, I wrote that I’d like to chat with someone who:1. Has just completed their 1st year of full-time trading2. Started with a minimum of $20,0003. Is or isn’t profitable (not important), as long as he/she is taking deliberate action to improveFrom this tweet I received many DM’s for consideration, and after filtering through them, I’ve asked several people who fit this general descript...
2020-01-241h 05
Chat With TradersSudhu Arumugam – Advancing Crypto Ecosystem—Post Two Decades of Institutional TradingJoining me on this episode is Sudhu Arumugam, the co-founder and Chief Risk Officer of cryptocurrency futures exchange CoinFLEX.Though prior to this, Sudhu spent near 20-years in various trading roles for banks and hedge funds—mostly transacting in options on indices and single stocks, exotic derivatives and fixed income.We start things off by talking about Sudhu’s early days and experience in London’s LIFFE trading pit, meeting and trading with DRW founder Don Wilson—who he identified as a “force to be reckoned with.” Sudhu also speaks about heading a small institutional trading team...
2020-01-1456 min
Chat With TradersJaime Rogozinski – The Reckless Abandon of WallStreetBets—Where Brazen Risk-Taking Runs RampantJaime Rogozinski, a serial entrepreneur who resides in Mexico, is the man responsible for bringing WallStreetBets to life—the infamous and wildly popular subreddit, which proudly boasts the tagline, “Like 4Chan found a Bloomberg terminal.”In other words, WSB is an online forum (on Reddit) where the majority of it’s 700k+ members aren’t looking to establish long-term, sustainable trading careers. Instead they’re buying lotto tickets on commission-free trading apps, taking almighty risks, and attempting to strike it rich fast.This is a community, of mainly unsophisticated investors, where losses of 10’s and 100’s of thousands o...
2019-12-1853 min
Chat With TradersMike Mangieri – Behind the Scenes of an Equities Day Trading FirmMike Mangieri’s a co-founder and managing partner of Seven Points Capital—a proprietary trading firm in New York, and with several smaller offices in other U.S. cities as well as Toronto.Although Mike occasionally trades in volatility products, his days mostly revolve around operations of the firm and overseeing the traders. Therefore he has a slightly unique perspective on things, compared to the perspective of an individual trader…In our conversation we roll through subjects, such as; the birth of a trading firm, a day in the life of Mike, monitoring risk—both, on a fir...
2019-11-281h 15
Chat With TradersGregory Zuckerman – Jim Simons—The Pinnacle of Trading GreatnessGregory Zuckerman is a writer at the Wall Street Journal and author of The Man Who Solved the Market: How Jim Simons Launched The Quant Revolution.For anyone unfamiliar, Jim Simons is the brilliant-minded mathematician who founded hedge fund Renaissance Technologies. Using quantitative models and with billions in AUM, Renaissance has averaged annualized returns of net 39% since 1988. And these returns only become more spectacular, once you discover that Renaissance investors pay a management and performance fee of 5 and 44—therefore bringing the gross annualized returns to 66%.Due to the superior performance, today, Jim has an estimated ne...
2019-11-151h 07
Chat With TradersNico, @InefficientMrkt – An Eight Year Overnight Success Story: Three Years LaterNico, who goes by @InefficientMrkt on Twitter, is an intraday equities trader. His area of expertise lies in low float, micro cap stocks, near-exclusively playing the short side of overextended moves.Nico and I spoke almost exactly 3 years ago on episode 96—which was memorably titled, "An 8-year overnight success story." Now picking up where we left off, we discuss what's been happening as of late...The most notable development being; after many years trading retail, Nico has gone into proprietary trading with Seven Points Capital. Going one step further, he has also established and heads up...
2019-10-301h 16
Chat With TradersRobert Greifeld – Crisis Averted: Saving Nasdaq From a Path of RuinThis episode features high-profile American businessman, Robert Greifeld, who from 2003-2017 served as the CEO at Nasdaq—one of the world's largest and widely known financial exchanges.Bob came into this role at a time when Nasdaq was on the verge of an internal crisis, he was tasked with turning it around and making transformational change. Throughout our conversation, he tells of the critical moments and drastic actions, insight to Nasdaq's many acquisitions and its business model, plus lessons in leadership and career advice.Having since stepped down from Nasdaq CEO, Bob's recently written a bo...
2019-10-1552 min
Chat With TradersLarry Hite – Reflection on Markets & Life—With a Man Who’s Had Vast Financial SuccessThere’s no other way to say it; Larry Hite is the definition of a market veteran, he’s someone who first developed an interest for trading and markets during the 60’s…Besides a reputation for extreme risk management, Larry is perhaps best known as co-founding Mint Investments—a hedge fund formed in 1981. He’s also considered to be one of the forefathers of trading systems and a pioneer of trend following.By 1988, Mint achieved an average annual compounded return of over 30%—it’s best year being 60% (in 1987, the year of the stock market crash) and it’s worst y...
2019-09-241h 00
Chat With TradersMike Komaransky – Going All In: The Fixed Income Trader Early to BitcoinFor many, this will likely be the first time hearing about Mike Komaransky, but those who know him already, know him as a Bitcoin OG—and deservedly so, as he began accumulating the cryptocurrency around 2010.Though Mike has been a professional trader of fixed income derivatives since 2001, when he joined powerhouse trading firm DRW. Mike later became a partner at DRW, and in 2014 he launched its cryptocurrency trading business Cumberland—which grew to become one of the world’s largest market makers.After leaving the company in 2017 and a hiatus from active trading, Mike has return...
2019-08-271h 22
Chat With TradersNick Radge – The Blueprint: Create a Simple Trend Following SystemReturning guest Nick Radge is a systematic trader of trend following, momentum and mean reversion strategies—which he runs across Australian and U.S. equity markets.When I asked Nick if he'd be willing to do another podcast, I said to him, "This time around, I'd like to discuss something very specific with you; how to create a simple trend following system."So, that's exactly what we did; a complete breakdown of Nick's process. This includes details about strategy objectives and idea generation, portfolio testing and analyzing results, position sizing and risk management, and execution in...
2019-08-061h 31
Chat With TradersSam Bankman-Fried – Leaving Wall Street, Entering Crypto ChaosThis episode features Sam Bankman-Fried, who’s trading skill originated from 3-years at Jane Street—a proprietary trading firm renown for being one of the world’s largest ETF liquidity providers.In late-2017, Sam relocated to Hong Kong and began his foray into the cryptocurrency market when he co-founded Alameda Research. Alameda trade a range of quantitative strategies—such as statistical arbitrage and market making—which are mostly automated, but with a layer of human intervention.Within 2-years Alameda has grown to a point, where each day, it does approximately one billion dollars of turnover across 35...
2019-07-221h 07
Chat With TradersAlex, @TAGRtrades – Can the Family Breadwinner Become a Full-Time Trader?This episode takes on a slightly different format to normal. Essentially, it’s a response to an email that I received from a listener…The email comes from a gentleman who’s 38 years old with a full-time job, his wife is currently studying and he has three kids. He also has the goal to transition out of his current career into full-time trading, but he has a family who are dependent on his income. And that’s the part he has questions about.Therefore, I asked Alex (@TAGRtrades) if he’d be willing to join me on this...
2019-06-2152 min
Chat With TradersJonathan Shapiro – Investigating and Exposing the Crafty Schemes of Public CompaniesJonathan Shapiro's a senior reporter at the Australian Financial Review. While he writes about a range of subjects from banking to hedge funds to private equity, he's renown for stories that uncover dishonesty and the crafty schemes of listed companies—for which, he's won several awards.Our conversation begins with Jonathan telling the story of Blue Sky Alternative, a fund manager that came unstuck following the release of a short sellers research report. From there, we roll into a very detailed discussion about about Jonathan's investigative work on Big Un.Without saying too much, Big wa...
2019-05-301h 16
Chat With TradersNishant Porbanderwalla – Opportunity Meets Experience—Defining Moments of One Traders' Career’d like you to meet part-time Bollywood DJ, full-time equities trader: Nishant Porbanderwalla.For the past 12-years and ever since leaving college, Nish has been a proprietary trader at Kershner Trading Group—KTG is a trading firm in Austin (Texas) founded by Andy Kershner, who appeared back on episode 128.Nish was very open in talking about the ups and downs he’s endured throughout his career, including actual PnL and the psychological states. He also tells an incredible story from trading the Flash Crash of August 2015—although it was only a very short moment in time, it...
2019-05-081h 10
Chat With TradersMichael Katz – Riding Price Action—A Complete Breakdown of the Lyft IPOAfter appearing on Chat With Traders last year for episode 156, Michael Katz returns: Mike’s a short-term equities trader and managing partner of proprietary trading firm Seven Points Capital.The purpose of doing this episode was to have a very specific and detailed discussion about how Mike traded ride share company Lyft on the first day of its IPO (Mar 29).And to make it easier for you to follow along with our discussion, I’ve included intraday charts with Mike’s entries and exits in the show notes—go to: chatwithtraders.com/173Note: You are...
2019-04-1059 min
Chat With TradersAnthony Riley – Clawing Back a Six-Figure LossAnthony is a proprietary futures trader from Sydney, with 10-years market experience. He's active—particularly during the night—in a range of products, such as; Australian and U.S. bonds, equity indices, currencies and a few commodities. While he's a click trader, Anthony is quite systematic with his processes and strategies—which are mostly trading spreads between correlated products.Naturally, we speak about many things during this episode, but one of the highlights was hearing about how Anthony got himself into a six-figure drawdown and was able to claw it back in just one-month. We spend quite a bit...
2019-03-151h 22
Chat With TradersStan Gluzman – Raid the "Money Box"It’s with great pleasure that I introduce to you, Stan Gluzman; an intraday equities trader at proprietary trading firm Seven Points Capital. Stan also heads up a small team of junior traders at one of the firms’ additional offices—outside of New York—in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.We discuss Stan’s path to consistent profitability as a prop trader, and then we get into specifics about the various strategies that Stan has traded in recent years—including the actual strategies that he implements today. I also ask Stan to share details about the various forms of analysis (sta...
2019-02-161h 18
Chat With TradersJoshua Greenwald – The Technology Edge—How a Team of Options Market Makers Found Success in AsiaMy guest on this episode is Joshua Greenwald, the CEO of a newly formed crypto derivatives exchange, LXDX. But the part that got me keen to speak with Josh, was the fact that he was a professional trader for more than 10-years prior…Josh started his career at DRW Trading in Chicago, he then left after six years and went on to co-found Greenlight Trading—a proprietary firm specializing in low-latency options market making, almost exclusively for Asian markets. Greenlight grew to be a team of approximately 30-people, before it was acquired.Over the next hour...
2019-01-171h 16
Chat With TradersJack Ma – Strategies Die, Skills SurviveJack Ma is a proprietary futures trader from Sydney and the head trader of Minter Capital—a firm he established this year, in which he currently mentors and backs a group of developing traders.Jack trades an “inventory style” in the market of Australian 90-Day Bank Bills—continually working structures around his expectations of yield strip movements, with minimal exposure to outright risk. He also trades Australian 3-year and 10-year Government Bonds, but predominantly during rolls (contract expiry).During this conversation, you’ll hear about Jack’s progression over the past 5-years—breakthroughs and lessons learned, plus...
2018-12-201h 28
Chat With TradersAnand "Lucci" Sanghvi – Stay Alive, Wait for Your Market, Then All Guns BlazingIf you’ve been through the archives, then this weeks guest will be no stranger; it’s the options madman and trader of 10+ years, Anand “Lucci” Sanghvi.Lucci was one of the first guests to appear on Chat With Traders—back in 2015. As you can imagine, there’s been plenty happening since then, so we took this opportunity to catch up…Topics of discussion range from life in Puerto Rico, dealing with taxes as a trader, a failed hedge fund, what’s been working for Lucci in equity options—and how he’s continued to evolve in recent yea...
2018-11-281h 35
Chat With TradersBobby Cho – Crypto’s Not Dead (It Just Went Pop)Bobby Cho is the global head of trading at Cumberland—which is the crypto arm of Chicago trading firm, DRW and it’s one of the largest liquidity providers in the space. Prior to this, Bobby was director of trading at itBit and vice president of trading at Digital Currency Group (formerly known as SecondMarket).After featuring on the podcast in August last year, I thought it would be fitting to check in with Bobby again, because of the events which have unfolded in cryptocurrency markets over the past 12 months…Our conversation begins with some of the...
2018-10-3150 min
Chat With TradersHugo Bowne-Anderson – The Trader’s Guide for Learning to Code (with a Data Scientist)For this episode, I speak with Hugo Bowne-Anderson; a data scientist at DataCamp (an educational platform for learning to code) and host of the DataFramed podcast.The idea for asking Hugo to appear on this episode, was to chat about learning a programming language. Because for some traders, having the ability to write code can have great advantages—such as having the ability to collect stats on market behavior, perform research in a robust data-driven way, visualize large amounts of data, backtest and analyse trading ideas, implement algorithmic strategies, etc.Plus more professional trading firms an...
2018-09-2757 min
Chat With TradersMichael Samuels – Speculating on Mergers—and a Case of “Excessive” Due DiligenceI was introduced to this weeks guest by an experienced trader and fund manager, who described him as being "hands down the best trader I know..."Michael Samuels is an equities trader, who once traded for First New York and Apex Capital, he now trades his own money under the banner of Broome Street Capital.Michael describes himself as being an 'event driven trader' with a primary focus on news flow surrounding mergers and acquisitions, shareholder activism and fundamentals—to seek out valuation disconnects.During this episode you'll hear about merger-arb strategies (including ex...
2018-09-101h 03
Chat With TradersNick Fabrio – How to Scalp ASX Stocks and Make a Pretty PennyNick Fabrio is an exceptional day trader. With a bias for short selling and playing catalysts on the Australian stock market, Nick had surpassed a million dollars in trading profits within his first three years. And all along, he’s been a self-directed ‘retail’ trader.Although he currently lives in Texas, Nick and I were able to catch up, sit down and record this podcast while he was back in Sydney last month. We got talking about many things; from dealing chips at The Star casino to receiving threats from a company’s lawyers, analyzing market depth and ever...
2018-08-021h 25
Chat With TradersJohn "Rambo" Moulton – An Evening with a Veteran Trader [LIVE]This special episode of Chat With Traders was recorded in June 2018, in front of a live audience in Sydney. It’s a conversation I had with John Moulton, though better known as Rambo.John’s a serious trader, and for good reason, he’s considered to be somewhat of a legend trader in Australia…In short, John left the Chicago trading pits in the 80’s, bound for the Sydney Futures Exchange. During the years that followed, he became a VERY large spread trader of Government Bonds and Bank Bills—he was responsible for a major share of the...
2018-07-041h 14
Chat With TradersMike Bellafiore – The Formula for How to Become a 7-Figure Day TraderReturning for this episode, is Mike Bellafiore—the co-founder of New York City prop trading firm, SMB Capital. Mike is also the author of One Good Trade and The Playbook, and he was the featured guest on episode 022.As the title suggests, the purpose of our conversation is to breakdown how you can formulate a plan for becoming a 7-figure day trader. Mike is well-qualified to speak on this subject, because he’s mentored and lead traders within his own firm to reach this level of trading success.There are no quick fixes packed into this...
2018-05-121h 12
Chat With TradersMike Agne – When There’s Blood in the Water, Sharks Will ComeFor this episode, I got to catch up with Mike Agne (@EconEmotions). I know some of you will be well acquainted with Mike; I first interviewed him last year in New York—in person for a live event, and then he was on the podcast in August last year too.Mike’s trading experience runs deep in bonds/fixed income, also index futures and options. And for a long time he was a prop trader at the renown TransMarket Group. Additionally, Mike writes an excellent weekly newsletter about global markets.Catching up this time, we talk...
2018-04-211h 01
Chat With TradersKimberly Trautmann – Why Trading Powerhouse, DRW, is Directing Profits into Venture CapitalFor this episode of Chat With Traders podcast, ironically, I’m not chatting with a trader. Instead, I’m speaking with Kimberly Trautmann and she’s Head of DRW Venture Capital.DRW began as a Chicago trading firm, founded by Don Wilson 25 years ago. Since then, it has grown to be one of the world’s largest firms, with offices in six major cities around the globe and over 800 employees.It has also become much more than solely a trading firm—the firm’s operations have extended to cryptocurrency market making, large scale property development, and of cours...
2018-03-1242 min
Chat With TradersGreg Newman – Bringing Stoicism to Trading—and Market Making in Oil DerivativesI was recently introduced to Greg Newman by James King [Episode 133]. The two previously worked together at Mandara Capital, a London Trading firm…There, James was the performance director (with a background in sports science), and Greg was head of a highly successful oil trading desk—which he built from the ground up in three years, with some guidance from James for overcoming obstacles.Now, Greg remains a serious participant in oil derivatives and has gone on to become a founding partner of Onyx Commodities. Greg and his firm are most active in oil futures (and...
2018-02-261h 19
Chat With TradersPhil, @OzarkTrades – Short Hype Stocks, Long FarmlandPhil Goedeker has been trading stocks for, roughly, 15 years. He started young, in college, made a truckload of money in a short period of time, which then afforded him the luxury of never having to work a “real job.”Admittedly, Phil will tell you, luck was a major factor early on. Nonetheless, he’s been abundantly successful since, and has continued trading—now with a strategy, with rules and with an edge. Phil’s way of trading is to short parabolic moves—on low float stocks which have been seriously hyped up, and when he senses golden opportunitie...
2018-02-101h 01
Chat With TradersAlex, @TAGRtrades – What This Day Trader Learned After Returning 1400% in One YearWhen Alex (@TAGRtrades) was on CWT for the first time—Episode 119, he was beginning to make head way as a full-time day trader, since abandoning a secure job in recent years. But since then, he’s really stepped it up a notch…Alex started 2017 with an account balance of $32,000 and finished the year with a compounded return of 1,400%. But what makes things more significant, is how he was able to achieve this with minimal drawdown.Over the course of this episode, you’re going to hear Alex and I reviewing his performance of the past twelve m...
2018-01-271h 02
Chat With TradersMichael Katz – Day Trader, Green Every Month, Talks Consistency, Strategy and Doing SizeMichael Katz is an active day trader and the managing partner of New York prop trading firm, Seven Points Capital. Mike and his firm, are large volume participants in U.S. equity markets, and to a lesser extent, futures and options too.In this episode, Mike discusses the things which have attributed most to his consistency over the years, insight to his momentum strategies, and how he’s able to turnover millions of shares each month, and of course, plenty more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
2018-01-131h 00
Chat With TradersAnthony Saliba – The Trader’s Guide to Building Generational WealthAnthony Saliba, an original Market Wizard, was first on episode 107. On that episode, we mostly discussed Tony’s life as a trader and related subjects. But one area we didn’t get into too much, was his life as a parallel entrepreneur and an investor.So, I mentioned to Tony, this time around, it’s something I’m keen to hear a lot more about. Because his success extends far beyond trading alone…For example; LiquidPoint, an options execution and technology firm which Tony founded, was acquired in 2007 for a sum of mid nine-figures. He’s also inves...
2017-12-291h 24
Chat With TradersAndreas Koukorinis – When a Quant Trader Enters the World of Sports Betting…Andreas Koukorinis lives in London and in 2013 he co-founded Stratagem Technologies—a tech startup using AI and machine learning to trade sports as a financial product. These sports predominately include; football, tennis and basketball.But for Andreas, his roots are in trading instruments and markets that most of us are more accustomed to. He’s worked for the likes of Morgan Stanley and Deutsche Bank, and before Strategem came to be, he was trading at DeepValue.From listening to this episode, you’ll soon notice that Andreas is passionate about applying rigorous trading principles to nascen...
2017-12-1657 min
Chat With TradersXiao Qiao – Research Analyst Shares Practical Ways to do Better ResearchXiao Qiao is a research analyst for a Connecticut-based hedge fund, focused on trading commodity futures. He graduated with a PhD in Finance—and was a teaching assistant to renown economist Eugene Fama.Notably, Xiao has also worked directly with trading legend Blair Hull on two quantitative research projects, which concern market timing and return predictability.The main objective of this episode with Xiao, is to learn how a research analyst thinks about things directly related to research, and ways that you can do better market research for yourself.On top of this, Xi...
2017-12-071h 04
Chat With Traders152: Kory Hoang – A beginners foray into (part-time) systematic tradingKory Hoang is not a veteran trader—he’s not someone who has been doing this 10-20 years. He’s someone who has been doing this for only a few years, yet he’s begun to make decent gains on his trading capital. Kory is also not a full-time trader …well, at the time of recording this—a few weeks ago—he wasn’t! Kory was a private equity analyst for Pitchbook, who traded on the side. But he’s since informed me that he’s handed in his notice and taken the leap to focus on trading (plus a coup...
2017-11-3000 min
Chat With TradersRick Lane – Perspective From a Trading Technologist—Attacking Unique ProblemsRick Lane is the current CEO of Trading Technologies—a software provider that develop high-performance trading platforms which are used by; proprietary traders, hedge funds, CTAs, brokers and banks etc.The reason why I asked Rick to appear on this episode is because, as we know, not everyone is cut out to be a trader. And that’s fine! I’d like to highlight, there are many other roles in the world of trading where you can have a great impact by leveraging skills which you may have already attained…Prior to teaming up with his cous...
2017-11-171h 05
Chat With TradersAaron Brown, Pt. 2 – A Lesson in Risk Taking—with the Former Risk Manager of a $200B FundFollowing on from Episode 149, here’s part two of the interview with Aaron Brown.To refresh your memory, Aaron is highly regarded as an authority on the subject of risk taking. For the past 30-years he’s worked as a dedicated risk manager, and for the past decade, Aaron was the risk manager for renown quant fund, AQR.Coming up on this episode, you’ll gain deeper insight to how you can better understand and manage risk for yourself—we go over: Questions traders should be asking themselves, how to leave less money on the table, h...
2017-11-091h 04
Chat With TradersAaron Brown, Pt. 1 – A Lesson in Risk Taking—with the Former Risk Manager of a $200B FundAaron Brown is highly regarded as an authority on the subject of risk management. Although he originally started out as a poker player and sports bettor (then a trader and portfolio manager), for the past 30-years Aaron’s been a dedicated risk manager. And for the past 10-years, he was the risk manager for quant fund, AQR.Aaron has also authored several books (ranging in topics from poker to finance and risk), contributes to Bloomberg View and writes a column for Wilmott Magazine.On this episode, part one, we talk about: Aaron's early days playing po...
2017-11-021h 00
Chat With TradersJohn Grady – The Order Book—What Traders Must Know About Supply and DemandJohn Grady is an independent futures trader from Florida, who primarily trades Treasury bonds. His trading is purely discretionary, based upon his read of order flow. Essentially, he’s a scalper.Throughout this episode we talk all things order flow; the basics, the value of an order book, some of John’s trading methods, order types and managing positions, how to build skill at reading order flow, as well as, the impact of HFT and what’s commonly known as spoofing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
2017-10-261h 23
Chat With TradersDr Thomas Starke – Detective Work Leading to Viable Trading Strategies, and the Rise of AIDr Thomas Starke is a Physics PhD who once designed microchips, worked as an engineer for Rolls Royce and lectured at University of Oxford, before applying his know-how of modelling to financial markets…As a trader, Thomas has contracted to various funds and up until recently, he was a Quantitative Developer at a well-regarded Sydney prop trading firm.Thomas was great to chat with—not only did we talk about things related to quant trading, strategy development and robustness, but also his infatuation with disruptive technologies; artificial intelligence and quantum computing. Lear...
2017-10-191h 18
Chat With TradersRyan Moffett, Tyler Micalove & Wayne Klump – When Trading Becomes a Team Sport...On this episode, I’m joined by three traders from a data-driven, options trading, performance based fund, Blackpier Capital…Ryan Moffett, the Lead Investment Manager—and a prior guest on Episode 83. Tyler Michalove, who plays a key role in trade execution. And Wayne Klump, who heads up research and strategy development.We discuss mentoring, the benefits of working in a team, the upside to trading options, the unique edges which can be gained from the multiple dimensions inherent to options, an example of how options could potentially improve an existing strategy and plenty more.--
2017-10-121h 24
Chat With TradersAaron Fifield – Six Ways to Emulate Talented TradersHere’s the first episode in the history of Chat With Traders podcast, where I don’t have a guest with me. That’s because, this episode is the recording of a talk I gave at Noosapalooza 2017—a trading conference hosted by Nick Radge, here in Australia.Throughout the talk I pull upon many lessons and snippets of wisdom which have been learned through conversations here on this podcast. So, I’ve appropriately titled the talk; Six Ways to Emulate Talented Traders…--Sponsored by Scoop Markets: Use a powerful algo to analyse 1000’s of tweets ev...
2017-10-0544 min
Chat With TradersTim Steenstrup – Learn an Arbitrage Strategy Used by Professional Stock TradersSince 2013, Tim Steenstrup has been a cross-border arbitrage trader at Conventus Capital. Though markets have been a part of his life going back to 1994; Tim’s been part of a brokerage firm in Japan, a hedge fund—which was featured in The Big Short movie, and a prominent New York trading firm.As you’ll soon hear, we skim through Tim’s backstory and then spend a large part of this episode going into the mechanics of how a cross-border arbitrage strategy works. Tim does highlight, this strategy may be difficult to implement as a retail trader, but rega...
2017-09-2952 min
Chat With TradersMichael Kimelman – Convicted of Insider Trading—From Suburban Life to Prison LifeYou’re about to hear a first-hand account from someone who’s been on a wild ride through the U.S. justice system. My guest is Michael Kimelman; a former prop trader and hedge fund manager who was convicted (and served time) for insider trading…You’ll hear about the series of events leading up to his arrest, details about the trial, revelations of a rogue judge and the dim reality of life while incarcerated.If you get through this episode and you’re curious to know more, then you might be pleased to know Michael ha...
2017-09-211h 14
Chat With TradersBert Mouler – Using Creative Thought and Automation to Bypass Human FlawsIt was exactly 100-episodes ago when I first had Bert Mouler on the podcast. This week, I’m joined by him again for a second interview…Bert is an algorithmic trader with a serious focus on machine learning. His trading decisions are driven purely by data, and he goes to great lengths to remove human bias and flaws through the use of automation.So, coming up over the next 60-minutes or so, you'll hear about:
Bert's increasing efforts to automate as many decisions as possible
The attraction of markets and areas with less sophisticated part...
2017-09-141h 11
Chat With TradersErik Townsend – Software Millionaire Fooled by ‘The Dream’ and Saved by Global MacroFeaturing on this episode is former software entrepreneur turned hedge fund manager, Erik Townsend. I’m sure some will already be quite familiar with Erik—in particular the macro investing crowd, as Erik also hosts the Macro Voices podcast.After selling his company in 1998, Erik made a few lifestyle and investing decisions which he soon began to question, but took ownership of his situation and the discovery of global macro set him sailing in a new direction…Major talking points we cross off, include; how Erik uses the concept of The Fourth Turning and major cycles...
2017-09-071h 34
Chat With TradersJimmy Soni – The Life and Times of Genius Problem Solver, Claude ShannonMy guest on this episode is Jimmy Soni—who, with his co-author Rob Goodman, recently wrote the biography of Claude Shannon, titled; A Mind at Play.Shannon was born in 1916 and became one of the foremost intellects of the twentieth century, before passing away in 2001. He was a mathematician, a scientist, an inventor and also, a stock market investor…Although he’s widely unknown by the general public, Shannon is responsible for Information Theory—a revolutionary method of measuring information which stands behind much of the technology we use all day everyday.Shannon’s other achie...
2017-08-311h 17
Chat With TradersBobby Cho – Making Way for the 'Whales' of Cryptocurrency MarketsBobby Cho is a cryptocurrency trader at Cumberland Mining—which is a company of DRW Trading. Ever since getting involved in financial markets, during 2008, he has gravitated towards mostly illiquid/difficult-to-trade products…So, in some ways, it was inevitable that Bobby would begin to explore Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. This was around 2013, while Vice President at SecondMarket.In 2014, Bobby became Director at Bitcoin exchange, itBit, and then in 2016, joined Cumberland Mining—one of the largest institutional liquidity providers in cryptocurrency markets (predominately Bitcoin and Ethereum).During the episode, Bobby and I got speaking about...
2017-08-2442 min
Chat With TradersKevin Muir – In Search of the Next Great Trade—with The Macro TouristDuring the 90’s, Kevin Muir was a proprietary derivatives trader for RBC Dominion Securities. In 2000, Kevin branched out to begin trading independently, and since 2014, he’s been writing a daily blog, The Macro Tourist.Kevin’s unique in the sense that he fits the bill of two largely different trading types; an intraday trader and a global macro trader. He also doesn’t specialize in one particular thing, or certainly not to the extent that many traders do…Kevin can be quoted as saying, “I never know where I’m going to make money next year.” And tha...
2017-08-171h 25
Chat With TradersDr. William Ziemba – The Horse Bettor Exploiting Anomalies in Financial MarketsDr. William Ziemba’s an academic, a practitioner, gambler, trader and an author. He’s worked with and consulted to many well-respected names in the field, such as; Edward Thorp, Blair Hull and the very successful horse bettor, Bill Benter.In the beginning, horse betting was William’s field of expertise (he even published a book titled, Beat The Racetrack!) And in many ways, for William, horse betting worked as a gateway to trading financial markets—which he’s been doing since 1983.Now in current times, William manages a fund; Alpha Z Advisors—which started trading in J...
2017-08-101h 20
Chat With TradersMike Agne – Take Care of the Short Term; Take Care of the Long TermI first interviewed Mike at CWTNYC, in May 2017. The 100-listeners (give or take) who attended, will already be very familiar with Mike and there may be a few moments of déjà vu throughout this episode. But for everyone else…Mike came into trading around 20-years ago, beginning at Chicago prop firm, TransMarket Group, where he ultimately spent 12-years of his career. Over the course of his time there, Mike became one of their largest 30-year Treasury basis traders, both in terms of volume and performance.Now days, Mike is trading a relative value strategy thro...
2017-08-031h 17
Chat With TradersSheelah Kolhatkar – How Mastermind Trader, Steven Cohen, Bent Rules and Made BillionsSheelah Kolhatkar is a writer at the The New Yorker, who was previously a journalist at Bloomberg Businessweek, and prior to that, a hedge fund analyst.She’s also the author of New York Times bestseller, Black Edge: Inside Information, Dirty Money and the Quest to Bring Down the Most Wanted Man on Wall Street.Of course, the most wanted man being referred to, is the ultra-wealthy hedge fund legend, Steven Cohen of S.A.C. Capital Advisors—someone who Sheelah has become very familiar with, through much of her own tireless and strenuous research…D...
2017-07-2743 min
Chat With TradersBTCVIX – Bitcoin: The Magic Internet Money You Can No Longer IgnoreOn this episode, I have a returning guest—who first appeared on episode 53. His name is a mystery, but he goes by the handle: @BTCVIXEpisode 53 was the first time I covered Bitcoin on this podcast, and that was at the very end of 2015. As you’re probably aware, the cryptocurrency markets have evolved a lot since then, so BTCVIX is here to fill us in on what’s been happening and, potentially, what lies ahead…We also cover how to acquire various cryptocurrencies, best practises for protecting your coins, is Bitcoin in a bubble, the frenz...
2017-07-201h 16
Chat With TradersJames King – Using Sports Science to Stack Probability in Favor of Trading SuccessUp until recently, James King was the Performance Director at a commodity trading firm in London, Mandara Capital. And it was here that he implemented scientific methods to stack probability in the favour of success—by using techniques he learned from his education in Applied Sports Science and Performance Psychology.Now, James is setting out on a new venture, Project Thor, which aims to support talented retail traders with extra capital and other beneficial resources—which we discuss briefly towards the end of the episode.But for the most part, we discuss; principals for success, test...
2017-07-131h 09
Chat With TradersMark Gardner – Still Adapting After 80,000+ Hours of Screen TimeMark Gardner began working in the field at 17-years old, straight out of high school. Initially he began with back office duties, before broking on the floor of the Sydney Futures Exchange (SFE). Then later he was picked up by a large Bank Bills trader to exclusively execute trades, and who he learned a great deal from.Around 2005, Mark started trading his own book. Over the 10-years that followed, Mark had only two losing months—and to date, he’s never encountered a losing year. Though in 2015 he did suffer a substantial blow, losing months and months wort...
2017-07-0656 min
Chat With TradersMorgan Slade – Strategy Development, Powered by Machine LearningMorgan’s career as a trader and portfolio manager began 20-years back, and since then he’s worked at many prominent firms and funds—to name just a few; Millburn Ridgefield, Merrill Lynch, Citadel and Allston Trading.He’s currently the CEO of CloudQuant, a cloud-based algo development platform and fund.During our conversation, Morgan explains why he feels as though the ‘common’ approach to strategy development can be counter intuitive, and he gives an alternative 3-step formula. We also spend time discussing how machine learning fits into a traders toolbox Learn more a...
2017-06-291h 09
Chat With TradersBen Mallah – How to Own 100’s of Millions of Dollars of Real EstateBen Mallah is a trader of a different kind—he doesn’t trade stocks and bonds, he trades in real estate. You could probably call him a property developer, although he doesn’t build from scratch; he buys distressed apartment buildings, hotels and shopping centers, fixes them up, and then sells to make a profit.He grew up in one of the roughest areas of New York and had a very tough upbringing, but Ben is the true definition of a ‘rags to riches’ story…During his early 20’s, as a side hustle while working in the militar...
2017-06-2252 min
Chat With TradersVictor Haghani – Optimal Bet Sizing—Lessons From a Biased Coin Flip ExperimentVictor Haghani began his career at Salomon Brothers in 1984, starting out in a research role before joining their prop trading desk. In 1992, Victor left Salomon to become one of the founding partners of Long Term Capital Management…LTCM was an incredibly successful hedge fund, up until 1998, when it failed in a spectacular fashion. Causing the Federal Reserve to step in and organize a bailout, in order to prevent the possibility of a collapse in the global financial system.Victor took a ten year sabbatical after the dust settled, and in 2010 he founded an active index inv...
2017-06-1542 min
Chat With TradersAndy Kershner – Risk Tolerance, Daily Habits and Trade CritiquesAndy has been an active stock trader since the early 90’s, and in 2001 he founded Kershner Trading Group—a proprietary trading and technology firm in Austin (Texas) and, through a partnership with SMB Capital, Kershner Trading have a second office in Midtown (Manhattan) too.So, what did we talk about? Andy's ability to take pain on adverse positions, whether or not this has been a key ingredient to his trading success, and do traders with higher risk tolerances make more money. Andy also shares his daily habits and critiques a trade which didn't go so well from the...
2017-06-0849 min
Chat With TradersNell Sloane – Becoming a CTA—How to Begin Managing MoneyThough not a trader herself, Nell Sloane has been in and around markets and exchanges for roughly 30-years, mostly working in roles that assisted commodity traders and brokers in one way or another.Then since 2006, Nell has been the Principal of Capital Trading Group—a Chicago investment firm, which she co-founded with Patrick Lafferty. And this is the reason why I asked Nell to come on the podcast; because the role of CTG is to support traders who wish to expand their operation by managing money for others as a CTA.CTG do also offer se...
2017-06-0259 minChat With Traders126: Jonathan (@HF_Trader) – The demeanor of an unstoppable futures traderJonathan (@HF_Trader) got into trading after a sports-related injury changed his life trajectory. He was fortunate enough to meet and be mentored, early on, by one of the first people to be hired at Steve Cohen’s S.A.C. Capital Advisors—where this person ran a multi-billion dollar statistical arbitrage fund. After getting a dual degree in economics and quantitative finance, Jonathan landed a job within a hedge fund and was promoted to head trader within the space of about 6-months. Over the course of several years, while Jonathan worked at the fund, their assets unde...
2017-05-2500 min
Chat With TradersMatthew Hoyle – Getting Hired—Who Trading Firms and Hedge Funds Are Seeking OutMatthew Hoyle was once a trader, or more specifically, an options market maker. And he started at a very young age, on the exchange floor in Amsterdam. But since 2003, he’s been in the headhunting (or recruiting) business. His firm, Matthew Hoyle Financial Markets.Essentially, Matthew finds the best candidates for hard to fill roles. He’s contracted by banks, hedge funds and all sorts of trading firms—for example; Tibra, Optiver, Tower Research, Citadel, Millennium Partners, amongst many others.Matthew’s deeply knowledgeable on the industry, and he’s won many awards for doing what he do...
2017-05-1859 min
Chat With TradersMax, @Madaznfootballr – When Chasing a Quick Buck Becomes Making a Quick BuckMax got into trading about six years ago, after a co-worker pulled up in a brand new Lotus Elise—paid for with gains from trading BP stock. Working as an engineer at the time, with average pay, it wasn’t long before Max opened his first trading account and got to work…Having now developed a unique style of his own, which he describes as a scalping method—focusing on NASDAQ listed stocks, Max has become very consistent and profitable. (If you’re interested, max regularly posts PnL on his Twitter account.)To mention a few of the...
2017-05-111h 12
Chat With TradersDarren Reed – Grit, Hustle, Intent—and EnvironmentDarren Reed (@LiftTheOffer) has been a stock broker, the head trader at a $300M hedge fund, and an active prop trader at Australian firms, Propex, Aliom and Gensis. At the later two, he also mentored traders as part of his role in trader development.But this year (2017), Darren has returned to Perth—on the west coast of Australia, to establish a new proprietary trading firm with a few partners; Cygnet Trading.The main focus of this episode can be summarized with just a few words; grit, hustle and intent. Further, Darren speaks about paying your du...
2017-05-041h 47
Chat With TradersDoug Cifu – Virtu: Hitting Singles All Day Long—On a Global ScaleDoug Cifu is the co-founder and CEO of Virtu Financial, one of the largest electronic market making firms in the world. Around the clock, Virtu are trading in 12,000 instruments, across 235 markets and 36 countries, with only 140 staff.Virtu often trade more than 4.5 million times a day, and prior to their IPO in 2015, Virtu reported the firm had made a profit 1,277 out of 1,278 days—losing money just one day between 2009 and 2014.And in recent news, Virtu made headlines 20th April (2017), after announcing their acquisition of rival, Knight Capital Group for $1.4 billion.Doug is also the co...
2017-04-2739 min
Chat With TradersMichael Mauboussin – Tactics for Better Decision Making, and Skill Versus LuckMichael Mauboussin is a Managing Director and Head of Global Financial Strategies at Credit Suisse. He’s also a professor of finance at Columbia Business School, and the author of several books, such as; The Success Equation and More Than You Know.Michael is widely-recognized as a thought leader on the subject of decision making, as well as thinking about things in the way of process over outcome, and skill vs luck.And it’s these three things which are the over-arching theme of this episode. So hopefully, you’ll pick up a few good tips f...
2017-04-2056 min
Chat With TradersMeb Faber – A Crash Course in Long-Term Investing—For Short-Term TradersMebane Faber is the founder and CIO at Cambria Investment Management, where he manages Cambria’s ETFs, separate accounts and private investment funds. He’s also authored numerous white papers and five books now, on various investing subjects. Meb’s a budding podcaster too, his podcast; The Meb Faber Show.The main reason why I asked Meb to join me for this episode, was to share some simple ways that active traders can capitalize on the opportunity and compounding effect that (somewhat passive) longer-term investing has to offer.So, I ask Meb about; where to start...
2017-04-131h 13
Chat With TradersAlex, @TAGRtrades – What This Day Trader Learned After Four Years of Abandoning a Secure JobAlex (@TAGRtrades) is a 27-year old day trader, from Texas. He’s been trading full-time for four years, and has really begun to hit his stride. Alex closed Q1 of 2017 with a $49,000 gain, after going into the year with an account balance of $32,000.He’s a small-cap momentum trader, but unlike most guests who I’ve had on previously that play in this space, Alex takes the majority of his trades on the long side. So naturally, we chat about his reasons for this…We also chat about; the leap into full-time trading, key lessons Alex lea...
2017-04-061h 02
Chat With TradersManoj Narang – Trading Technology, Alternative Data and OriginalityHigh-speed trading veteran, Manoj Narang, originally worked on Wall St for the likes of Credit Suisse and Goldman Sachs prior to founding Tradeworx, which became one of the larger trading firms in the U.S. (in terms of volume).He’s since parted ways with Tradeworx to start MANA Partners—an innovative quant fund which raised almost one billion dollars for it’s launch in January this year (2017).As a brief summary for some of the things we got to chat about; the value of technology which drives some trading operations, capitalizing on the explosion of dat...
2017-03-3058 min
Chat With TradersLarry Alintoff – Traders' Opportunity—When Things That "Should" Happen, Don't HappenLarry Alintoff was a prop trader for Paul Tudor Jones, before running the largest group of traders on the AMEX (at the time). When he later went over to the NYBOT, Larry became the largest trader in the Frozen Concentrated Orange Juice pit, and now days, he’s CIO of The Toro Fund.During this episode, we cover; the thing which helped Larry to become consistent, why there’s great opportunity in knowing when things that “should” happen, don’t happen, and how he’s been able to successfully apply a similar trading style from the floor to the scree...
2017-03-231h 11
Chat With TradersSean Hendelman – Taking Losses, Ultimately Winning, and Keeping Pace With MarketsSean Hendelman is the co-founder and CEO of T3 Companies.T3 is one of the larger proprietary trading firms in the U.S. And incase you’re curious, the three T’s of T3 stand for; trading, training and technology.A few of the things Sean and I spoke about, include; how he got his start, how he lost all his money twice—and why it was a worthwhile experience (in hindsight), and some of the great lessons he’s learned from the business of trading.Even as CEO today, Sean is still very han...
2017-03-161h 06
Chat With TradersAdam Grimes – What Hand Traders Can Learn From System Traders, and Vice VersaAdam Grimes has been a trader for more than 20-years, he’s traded all major asset classes, across various timeframes. He’s traded independently, with a prop firm, and he’s run other trading businesses also.The main focus of this episode is to explore some of the things which discretionary traders can adapt from quantitative traders, and vice versa—meaning, what things can quants take from those who rely on discretion.Then in the later part of this episode, Adam lays out a solid framework which can help struggling traders to move forward. As well as...
2017-03-091h 47
Chat With TradersBrannigan Barrett – The Process of Becoming a Bigger (and Better) TraderBrannigan Barrett is a futures day trader—who trades a total of eight markets, across; bonds, equity indices, currencies and commodities. He was previously a trader at prop firm, Futex, but is now part of Axia Futures.The subjects we cover during this conversation, include; how to progressively become a bigger (and better) trader, how a “dogfight” attitude has helped Brannigan’s trading career, how he prepares going into major news announcements, his daily process for journaling and being ready for “one good trade.” Plus, how to think about and achieve your trading goals. Learn more...
2017-03-021h 10
Chat With TradersBenjamin Small – Normalizing Bitcoin, and Exploring the Cryptocurrency EcosystemBenjamin Small is an electrical engineering PhD. He’s worked in quantitative research roles since 2006, at UBS, Citadel, Credit Suisse and the stock exchange, IEX.Today though, Ben is head of market structure at Gemini—the world’s first fully licensed and fully regulated Bitcoin exchange, which is based in New York.During this chat, we get into; payment for order flow and high frequency trading, why there’s an incentive to normalize Bitcoin, the cryptocurrency ecosystem, potential outcomes for the future of Bitcoin, and becoming a cashless society. Learn more about yo...
2017-02-231h 00
Chat With TradersJorge Soltero – Reminiscences of a Trader at Hull Trading Co.—and a Sell-Side CareerJorge Soltero began as a floor trader in Chicago, where he was an options market maker. A few years into his career, he landed a position at Hull Trading Company (the renowned firm of legendary trader, Blair Hull).After Hull Trading was bought by Goldman Sachs in 1999, Jorge became more of an institutional trader—not only working at Goldman, but later, UBS and Merrill Lynch too, where he specialized in options and ETFs.Listening to this episode you’re going to hear about; the culture of trading pits, exactly what it was like to be a tr...
2017-02-161h 12
Chat With TradersDavid Bush – Strategy Objectives, Statistical Significance, and Market BehaviorReturning to Chat With Traders for a second time is David Bush—first on episode 23.David began as a discretionary trader, more than 20-years ago, but over time he’s developed into a quant trader. And he’s exceptionally good at what he does; David’s been the first place winner of two (real money) trading competitions in recent years.Last time David was on we spoke fairly extensively about his path as a trader and a high-level overview of his process. This time around we covered plenty of new ground—exploring David’s process in greater d...
2017-02-091h 19
Chat With TradersGeorge, @RollyTrader – Learning to Trade, Momentum Setups, and Becoming a Venture CapitalistOn this episode, I’m joined by George—who goes by @RollyTrader on Twitter.George is an Australian equities trader, with a momentum/swing trading type of approach. In the past, George has held a few finance-related positions, but since late-2009 he’s mostly traded independently.During the interview, George and I got speaking about; lessons he learned early on, the effect that coaching and mentoring has had on his trading, specifics about the setups George trades, and also, his involvement with venture capital.--Sponsored by Gemini.com – The world’s first fu...
2017-02-021h 09
Chat With TradersEdward Thorp – The Man Who Beat the Dealer, and Later, Beat the MarketI’m not sure how to best say this, but Edward Thorp, is kind of a big deal…Not only in the world of financial markets, but he’s also a household name amongst the gambling scene. He’s the man who beat the dealer, and later, beat the market.It was during the late-50’s and early-60’s, when Ed, a math genius and professor at MIT, took on the challenge of discovering a way to get an edge playing gambling games such as blackjack, roulette and baccarat. Long story short; Ed won—and he’s now consi...
2017-01-261h 04