I didn't "get" into it... I invented it 
Half joking. Here is the story. Being fed up with combination of mafia and corrupted police in Ukraine, in 1996 came to Canada with visitor visa. Applied for immigration and, as a businessman from highly corrupted and criminal country, became a subject of background checking. Little did I know at the time - it took leisured state machine 4 years to make sure I am not a gangster. Meanhwile, having status of visitor, one cannot work... can run a business, however. So, with wife who couldn't work and two kids that couldn't go to school (same problem with status), I had to start business.
Now, put yourself in my shoes: with no English, no slightest experience in totally different and unfamiliar social and economic environment, what kind of business can you run? Logic says, one with minimal interaction with other people. At this point my line of thoughts stopped as I couldn't even imagine this kind of business. As it happens, chance came to rescue. Fleeting conversation with russian-speaking guy who showed me a chart of a stock he bought recently at 11 and was going to sell at 17. Realizing that I could not do all the research he told me about, I asked (don't laugh... or do, whatever
) whether stocks move on intraday basis so one could try and profit from them with no or little research; whether it's possible to send orders to buy and sell and get them filled in reasonable time - within 1 hour (yeah, I know, laugh all you want 
) . He said yes to both but he never heard of anyone doing that. Armed with electronic translator, I started surfing the web. In a month or so I had account with Datek. In couple more months I stumbled onto some sites that showed me I was not the first one to think of that. Damn, I was so proud to invent it The rest of a story is published.
There you go, glad if you got a smile or two.
Vad
Half joking. Here is the story. Being fed up with combination of mafia and corrupted police in Ukraine, in 1996 came to Canada with visitor visa. Applied for immigration and, as a businessman from highly corrupted and criminal country, became a subject of background checking. Little did I know at the time - it took leisured state machine 4 years to make sure I am not a gangster. Meanhwile, having status of visitor, one cannot work... can run a business, however. So, with wife who couldn't work and two kids that couldn't go to school (same problem with status), I had to start business.
Now, put yourself in my shoes: with no English, no slightest experience in totally different and unfamiliar social and economic environment, what kind of business can you run? Logic says, one with minimal interaction with other people. At this point my line of thoughts stopped as I couldn't even imagine this kind of business. As it happens, chance came to rescue. Fleeting conversation with russian-speaking guy who showed me a chart of a stock he bought recently at 11 and was going to sell at 17. Realizing that I could not do all the research he told me about, I asked (don't laugh... or do, whatever
) whether stocks move on intraday basis so one could try and profit from them with no or little research; whether it's possible to send orders to buy and sell and get them filled in reasonable time - within 1 hour (yeah, I know, laugh all you want ) . He said yes to both but he never heard of anyone doing that. Armed with electronic translator, I started surfing the web. In a month or so I had account with Datek. In couple more months I stumbled onto some sites that showed me I was not the first one to think of that. Damn, I was so proud to invent it The rest of a story is published.There you go, glad if you got a smile or two.
Vad