Chat With Traders

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.We speak about Christian funding his account from driving Lyft, his experience going full-time (favorable and adverse moments), the premise of his trading strategy, the forex market in general, among other things too. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome 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 show notes: chatwithtraders.com/189 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After 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 other reason, is to highlight some past interviews which you have missed or skipped over. If you’d like to hear the full interview with any guest featured, you’ll find the link in the show notes: chatwithtraders.com/188 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 description to share their experiences on the podcast…The first cab off the rank is Josh Evans; 30-something years of age, living in Melbourne (Australia), and actively trading ASX equities.This conversation with Josh follows his progression from newbie investor to intraday trader—including his motivation and preparation for going full-time. A few specific things which have helped Josh to get his equity curve pointing in the right direction. Plus, deliberate processes Josh has implemented for improvement, one piece of advice he received that made a difference, and that’s not all! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Joining 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 within Merrill Lynch and shares insight to its OTC dealings.Then in the later part, we speak more about crypto and the efforts of CoinFLEX to become a market leading exchange. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jaime 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 of dollars are so common that it’s considered the norm. And although less common, there’s also the occasional member who’s handsomely rewarded for his or her audacious risk-taking. It’s kind of insane what goes on here, especially because it’s real-life (minus the odd trolling stunt).But make no mistake, I’m not throwing shade at WSB! The brazen culture is fascinating and you can’t help but appreciate the rawness of it all, not to mention the comments provide priceless entertainment value. And there just might be some insight to gleam, if you look hard enough (even if it’s do the opposite!) Sound and rationale financial advice has no place on WSB.Speaking with Jaime, he tells how the subreddit evolved and took on a life of its own, highlights from the timeline; featuring a member who exposed an ‘infinite money cheat code’ on Robinhood and the infamous ‘Pharma Bro’ Martin Shkrelli who was once a moderator, plus the largest gains and losses in WSB history. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mike 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 firm and individual level, psychology and mindset, examples of general interactions that Mike has with the traders—and some of the difficult conversations he has from time to time, plus more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gregory 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 net worth of $23-billion. Greg describes him as being, “The greatest money maker in modern financial history.”Although journalists have previously covered the rise of Renaissance, for the longest time, much of it was still shrouded with mystery. But by gaining remarkable access to Jim and also many of the people around him, Greg has been able to tell the full story, in print, with detail and accuracy.Pick up a copy of The Man Who Solved the Market, available on Amazon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nico, 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 the firms' San Diego office.During the second half of this episode (from 40:20), I ask Nico to share how he's evolved as a trader in recent years—or more specifically; what has changed, what remains the same and what's been fine tuned. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This 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 book that details his entire experience at the helm. The book is titled Market Mover, and you can get a copy here.Today, Bob is the managing partner of Cornerstone Investment Capital—a fin-tech investment firm, and the Chairman of Virtu Financial—a prominent trading and technology firm. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices