Forged From The Financial Crisis

I read this site for over three years before mustering the nerve to comment.  It wasn’t fear of criticism or banishment, but rather respect for what I had found.  I was fresh out of college, had taken two jobs in the financial service industry, found each to be equally vile, and was desperately seeking someone to teach me something.  Academia won’t get you far in this game.  The sage words of battle-hardened traders will.  So I read backward to the inception, and have gone forward daily since.  Fly axioms began to stick.  Words from his wise elders like, “If it sounds too good to be true, it’s a fucking god damned lie.”  Still, I insisted on learning many lessons on my own.  In regard to trading stocks, most of the recent journey has been chronicled within the blogger network where I’m Raul3.  However, I wear many hats.

I won’t bore you with a lengthy autobiography, but will instead tell you who I currently am.  I am 27 years old and without children.  By day I am an accountant in a corporate setting.  Much of what was once tasked to this position I have fully automated.  Instead of touting my accomplishments to upper management, getting some bullshit raise and saddled with more meaningless work, I chose to continue appearing as if I do manual work to keep me busy.  This opens up my eyes to watch the markets.  They love me.  

Outside of my day job I own a business.  It’s more lucrative than my accountant gig and is almost fully automated.  My current and most ambitious project is the development of a portfolio of algorithms that automatically trade future contracts around the clock.  When you’re at home being a good father, I’m tinkering with these bots while listening to flamenco.  They are not HFTs of the dark pool variety, but rather order-flow scalpers using small position sizes of 1-4 contracts to take advantage of statistical arbitrage. 

I own many books, most of which I’ve read.  From the latest hot writers like Nate Silver and Tim Ferris to philosophic Greek scrolls heralded during Rome’s fall, I glean market knowledge from it all.  I’ll read a book on gardening and it will state something like, “A good tool holds its edge…” and I’ll think of my faithful EMAs.  My mind rarely deviates from the markets.

It all boils down to business acumen.  I won’t emulate The Fly like I did in my early blogging.  I will simply offer my views on the market, stocks I’m watching, and the reasons why.  I will toss in some Gaussian analysis of market profile, specifically in the /ES and /6e.  I will keep the opining to a minimum, and focus my efforts on objectivity as much as humanly possible.  Also, this will be my last campaigning post. Enough time has been spent!

Going forward, with our without a paycheck from iBankCoin, I’m going back to writing about what I love. 

Finally, an endorsement from any of the current iBC members would be a supreme honor.  If I’ve added value to your trading life, let it be known to your fellow readers.