Personal Info

So how did I get involved with the markets? Well, about 20 years ago or so my dad said something to me in a way that for some reason really caught my attention. He said something like the following, "Hey, you wanna see how to make a lot of money?" Of course I wanted to know what it was all about. I thought he hit all six numbers on the lottery or something but instead he hands me a book. Yeah, a book. I was a few years out of college and the last thing I wanted to see was another book. I was working in the environmental / biological sciences field and still am so yeah, zip zilch nada in regards to the financial industry, but starting reading this book nonetheless. My dad was quite a character so I had no idea what this book was about. The book was about trading commodities. You know, corn, wheat, pork bellies, cotton, orange juice, etc. I was hooked from page one.

This book detailed numerous charts about if you would have bought here and sold here you 'could' have made an 'easy' one, two, or 10 thousand dollars! Remember, this was about 20 years ago. No cell phones yet, no free real-time quotes, no real trading platforms anywhere near where they are now, and a sort of clunky internet too. But still, I devoured this book and probably about, and I kid you not, 20 or 30 other books on trading, technical indicators, trading systems, etc. Yes, I even read "Technical Analysis of the Futures Markets: A Comprehensive Guide to Trading Methods and Applications", by John J. Murphy. And yes, I read all 556 pages and made notes! And, when I found out that there were trading platforms available where you could write code to program your own trading systems I dove right in. Buy when the MACD is doing this and the Stochastics are doing this along with a little Bollinger Band tweaking, etc. I've written code for TradeStation©, MetaTrader© (FOREX markets), and now ThinkOrSwim©. Not so much 100 % trading systems anymore because they all ultimately fail, but more or less just price action and volume area set-ups; things that actually work.

Now, until this day I'm really not sure why I had so much interest in wanting to learn everything I could because of that one book. I'm sure it had something to do with being able to make some extra money but I think it also part of being able to take part in the largest financial playing field in the world where you can 'compete' against or with multi-millionaires within a trade trying to figure out why things are moving and where they might be heading. I guess it's kind of like a game where if you do your homework, play correctly, and know the rules you can be rewarded with money. Not a gift card or a free tire rotation, but real money. The possibilities are endless regarding how successful you can become based on your own hard work. This along with it is a very unique endeavor to be able to trade successfully and I want to be part of that unique group that someday can say after being asked what you do for a living and answer, "I am a full time equities trader." Had my father handed me this book while I was still in high school, I am 100% sure that might field of study in college would have been as close to 'Wall Street related' as possible. Life is a constantly changing puzzle.

Now we know people online that do this for a living and you may know someone personally that trades their own account but the majority of us do not. I'm not talking about your friend that is a broker, I'm talking about the millionaire next door who works at home. Do you know that person? I don't. We are all told from a very young age to try to be unique. Don't do what everyone else is doing 'just because'. Find your niche. I am determined to be 'unique'. My hope is to put some of this past 20 years of market information to help you be unique as well.