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Billion Dollar Day - Documentary 1986

  • #21
  • Jul 24, 2010 9:54am Jul 24, 2010 9:54am
Quoting thelws
I remember there was an old trader who posted once. He said he was like 50 something at that time of posting. He mentioned that in the old days, they would manually plot the candlesticks on a peice of paper with a ruler and pencil.

They basically had a rough idea of what the market was doing or where it might be going for the day. The rest was duking it out on the pits.

Profit!
Brings me back to when I met a retired trader in NY. He told me back then he and other equity traders used graph paper and manually drawn point & figured to chart the market visually but used price to make decisions. He must have done well for himself as he live in a sweet, expensive high rise apartment. All that he taught me about how the market moved and how to draw point & figures, I still couldn't tell you how to use PF charts. They were really in their own back then.
  • #22
  • Jul 24, 2010 10:04am Jul 24, 2010 10:04am
Quoting mfoste1
these guys were market makers................they dont trade off off charts bc they dont need to. Back then they more or less controlled the market with their large orders bc there were less players in the game. Retail and buy side trading is much different than sell side trading. Same goes for today, go look at futures pits do you see them looking at charts? hell no.......they set the prices which everyone else trades from
Can I clarify what you mean?

Let's say you are one of these guys, so called "Market Makers". You play with $100-150 million account. You "set the prices which everyone else trades from". "More or less you control the market with your large orders."

Are you saying that you're chances of losing is diminished?
Or your risks are lowered if you have a bigger account say $500million because you are a market maker who sets the price which everyone trades from, more or less control the market with your large order?

Is this what you are trying to say?
Are you saying that you don't really need much knowledge, experience and skills if you play with $500million accounts?

I'm aware of future pit traders, yes you are right they don't look at charts. I'm also aware that they come and go... No matter how big their account maybe.
  • #23
  • Jul 24, 2010 10:08am Jul 24, 2010 10:08am
Quoting songbo
Got to know a trader who used to be like the guys in the video.

Price coming out from their mouth is the price. Story like how he was screwed by Malayan bank who asked to buy 1 or 2 billions usd of thai baht during the asian financial crisis and baht rise after he sold. But this trader is also bastard because baht is comprises of basket of currencies mainly JPY. He went into the market and sold JPY.... and make the baht dropped.. lol !!!

He is no longer in the institutional and trade privately his own money. He uses 123 price action and breakout...
So its clearly evident that even an institutional trader with a bigger account can lose. So is it a lie that having a bigger account is safer? One is not safer with bigger accounts if they don't know what they are doing.
  • #24
  • Jul 24, 2010 10:11am Jul 24, 2010 10:11am
Quoting Troikaone1
The demise of the retail trader today, is a belief in indicators and black box systems vs. looking at the markets from a simplistic perspective.
Yeah, that's what I was trying to say, but I'm not as eloquent as you
  • #25
  • Jul 24, 2010 10:43am Jul 24, 2010 10:43am
Quoting CrucialPoint
Can I clarify what you mean?

Let's say you are one of these guys, so called "Market Makers". You play with $100-150 million account. You "set the prices which everyone else trades from". "More or less you control the market with your large orders."

Are you saying that you're chances of losing is diminished?
Or your risks are lowered if you have a bigger account say $500million because you are a market maker who sets the price which everyone trades from, more or less control the market with your large order?

Is...

as merlin said.....risk is purely a function of the trader....nothing else. Mathematically speaking, you have the same chances of winning or losing whether you have a 5k or 5B acct. however, market makers set prices which everyone else bases their trades on. So do market makers have an advantage? Yes, undoubtedly.....but as I said before, buy side trading and sell side trading is like comparing apples to oranges.......and no, im not saying that you dont need experience or knowledge if you trade a 500m acct, of course you do.
  • #26
  • Jul 24, 2010 10:56am Jul 24, 2010 10:56am
Quoting mfoste1
Paul Tudor Jones was wildly successful.......look him up
Thanks. Found a good interview with him here http://www.absolutereturn-alpha.com/...-Jones-II.html
  • #27
  • Jul 24, 2010 10:58am Jul 24, 2010 10:58am
If you look at the Paul Tudor documentary (1980s), you will see the exact type of gunslinger approach to trading the FX markets. This guy was calling in his orders to the MMs over the PHONE. He could have cared less about a chart. It may be possible to scalp the market in this manner, where you are making hundreds of thousands of dollars within 10 pip ranges or something. My long term goal is to trade that way....I just don't have the guts to do it yet. As I said before, these guys are not making these kinds of bets w/ their own money...and there are few retail traders that can push that type of volume around.
  • #28
  • Jul 24, 2010 11:06am Jul 24, 2010 11:06am
  •  Ideasmiths
  • | Joined Mar 2009 | Status: 一将功成万骨骷 Forex war! Win pips or die! | 30 Posts
Quoting Slack
Thanks. Found a good interview with him here http://www.absolutereturn-alpha.com/...-Jones-II.html
Thanks for the article, nice reading B-)

I like the part, quote "I see the younger generation hampered by the need to understand and rationalize why something should go up or down. Usually , by the time that becomes self-evident, the move is already over. When i got into the business, there was so little information on fundamentals, and what little information one could get was largely imperfect. We learned just to go with the chart. Why work when Mr. Market can do it for you?"

Hmmm....
  • #29
  • Jul 24, 2010 11:10am Jul 24, 2010 11:10am
Quoting Troikaone1
As I said before, these guys are not making these kinds of bets w/ their own money...and there are few retail traders that can push that type of volume around.
FYI, trading someone else's money; i.e., your employer, could/would increase the stress levels exponentially. I was a Buyer for an Aerospace company for 10 years and was far more careful with their money than I ever was with my own.
  • #30
  • Jul 24, 2010 11:13am Jul 24, 2010 11:13am
Quoting Ideasmiths
Thanks for the article, nice reading B-)

I like the part, quote "I see the younger generation hampered by the need to understand and rationalize why something should go up or down. Usually , by the time that becomes self-evident, the move is already over. When i got into the business, there was so little information on fundamentals, and what little information one could get was largely imperfect. We learned just to go with the chart. Why work when Mr. Market can do it for you?"

Hmmm....
Yep, that exact quote is what caught my eye too. Looking back at my trades, virtually every loser was preempted by a lengthly analysis on my part.
  • #31
  • Jul 24, 2010 12:15pm Jul 24, 2010 12:15pm
Quoting Slack
FYI, trading someone else's money; i.e., your employer, could/would increase the stress levels exponentially. I was a Buyer for an Aerospace company for 10 years and was far more careful with their money than I ever was with my own.
I have to agree with you to an extent. But these guys are paid to pull the trigger whether they want to or not (win or loss). The institutional trader will be provided with some form of compensation, so trading is not all about meeting basic necessities....they can focus on the task of trading...."for the most part". However, if they don't perform well, they will get axed. The retail trader is not being paid to pull the trigger and if he loses huge, he will have to cease from trading. The institutional trader can be given another chance to trade the institution's money if they deem him to be a good trader. Obviously there is stress on both sides....it is hard to say which is worse. However, I more greatly admire the retail trader who has to trade his own capital....if he screws up...there is no government bail out. The retail trader cannot turn to the government for a bail out if he blows out his account. The institutional trader can take enormous risks with other people's money because he knows that Uncle Sam will be there as a safety net (possibly no longer the case with this WS reform bill that just passed).
  • #32
  • Jul 24, 2010 9:33pm Jul 24, 2010 9:33pm
Quoting CrucialPoint
People use water to clean their butts, they still do today around the world. Only the Capitalist/Westernized world that don't.
Do you spy on westerners as they take dumps? No? Then don't presume to know their habits. I imagine my fellow westerners have drawn similar conclusions to me, and that for a properly clean result, both water and TP is necessary, preferably followed by a shower. It's a rare and lucky occasion when only TP is needed, but even then a wet wipe is advised for thoroughness. That said, even if it came down to using one or the other (TP or water), TP provides a superior result. Enough about that.

Quoting CrucialPoint
So what does that say about S/R, Fibonacci levels, lovely head n shoulder patterns, Multi Time frames, pin bars, etc... ???
A chart is simply an illustration of the underlying price movement. It isn't needed for support and resistance to exist, and the action of a pinbar exists regardless of whether or not we're watching it on a chart.

Quoting Troikaone1
This guy was calling in his orders to the MMs over the PHONE. He could have cared less about a chart.
He used charts.
  • #33
  • Jul 24, 2010 10:33pm Jul 24, 2010 10:33pm
Quoting Mr J
Do you spy on westerners as they take dumps? No? Then don't presume to know their habits. I imagine my fellow westerners have drawn similar conclusions to me, and that for a properly clean result, both water and TP is necessary, preferably followed by a shower. It's a rare and lucky occasion when only TP is needed, but even then a wet wipe is advised for thoroughness. That said, even if it came down to using one or the other (TP or water), TP
provides a superior result. Enough about that.
Wow, very thorough. No swamp ass for you!!
  • #34
  • Jul 24, 2010 11:32pm Jul 24, 2010 11:32pm
Quoting CrucialPoint
Yeah, notice how these guys weren't looking at charts...

So what does that say about S/R, Fibonacci levels, lovely head n shoulder patterns, Multi Time frames, pin bars, etc... ???

What a good nostalgia documenation filming my home town...

Sound that you are interested in fundamental, news, or sentiment trading - a path that I have never seriously touched. hahaha.

By the way, a friendly note for all, don't been so seriously about this kind of documentation by the outsiders - reporters who has little solid technical knowledge in the trading field, it was made for the outsiders.
  • #35
  • Jul 25, 2010 1:02am Jul 25, 2010 1:02am
Quoting kk007
Sound that you are interested in fundamental, news, or sentiment trading - a path that I have never seriously touched. hahaha.
I'm a scalper, I don't deal with fundamentals
  • #36
  • Jul 25, 2010 1:07am Jul 25, 2010 1:07am
Quoting Mr J

He used charts.
Yes....he did use charts throughout the documentary, but there was one scene where he was at his home in the predawn hours where he was on the phone talking to a MM. He was trying to place an order, but the MM was stalling as the price was rising. I don't recall him staring at a chart at the time. The MM was hesitant to take the other side of such a large order and was stalling to check and see if any US news was impacting the currency being traded. Someone will have to verify it for me because I don't have access to the video.
  • #37
  • Jul 25, 2010 2:23am Jul 25, 2010 2:23am
Quoting CrucialPoint
Yeah, notice how these guys weren't looking at charts...

So what does that say about S/R, Fibonacci levels, lovely head n shoulder patterns, Multi Time frames, pin bars, etc... ???

OK. This simply means that they didn't trade using technical analysis. They traded fundamental, news, or sentiment as you can see in the documentary. Finished!
  • #38
  • Jul 25, 2010 2:33am Jul 25, 2010 2:33am
Nice documentary. As someone said, they should make a 2010 version. Always trade your gut and cheat the market to make money.
Today I BUY, tomorrow I SELL!
  • #39
  • Jul 25, 2010 2:57am Jul 25, 2010 2:57am
Quoting kk007
OK. This simply means that they didn't trade using technical analysis. They traded fundamental, news, or sentiment as you can see in the documentary. Finished!
When I first started trading stock options years ago (around 1997). I had to call in my orders over the phone because I did not have internet access at work. I checked prices using a quote service over the phone w/o the use of charts. I guess I am dating myself a bit....but I sorta did the same thing these guys were doing, but on a smaller scale. I almost forgot how things were just 10+ years ago before the proliferation of the internet at the work place. With the advent of the internet and computer access, I can't imagine these large money managers making decisons w/o consulting a chart first. The other extreme is the use of these so called Quants that are being utilized by these large institutions. It is a scary thought that these money managers are making moves based on a mathematical model that they don't even understand.
  • #40
  • Jul 25, 2010 3:32am Jul 25, 2010 3:32am
Quoting sloanman
Wow, very thorough. No swamp ass for you!!
lol
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