How to get your trading CAREER started...

Why is everyone so concerned about working for a hedge fund, big bank or anything corporate? To me there is nothing better than the feeling of satisfaction of figuring it out on your own and leaving the rat race of pedigree, exams, networking and kissing ass to others.

It is not necessary if all you want to do is trade. A strategy, discipline and capital is all that is required at the most basic level.
 
Stockbroker and Trader are like Mars and Venus. ZERO comparison!!!!

I am a Broker. I suck at selling (products I don't believe in-which is 90% of them.) I do NOT enjoy going to the silent auctions to try to get snooty people to set appointments. I do NOT enjoy being surrounded by arrogant, a**hole Brokers who "think" they know trading. I do NOT enjoy the fact that the Brokers I used to work with at Merrill Lynch saw investors as just a number (asset gathering), and treated the ones with less than $500,000 like pond scum.

Needless to say, I went Independent, but Independent firms have their share of a** hole Brokers, so be warned. Being a Broker is about selling.

Being a trader is about trading. I am working towards transitioning to trader.

You have an edge over me OP. I have to "wash out" the garbage I learned as a Retail Broker, and what we were taught about the markets. (What we were taught was 95% geared towards a product that they needed pitched to investors.)

Start reading journals here, make notes of questions you have, google pivot points, channels, wedges, price action, etc.,and if stuck, just ask the guys at ET who are doing well. After reading, reading, and reading some more, you'll know who's in the know and who's FOS.

On a side note, you DO need your Series 7 if you're going to trade for a prop shop like Bright Trading, etc., NO, you won't be pitching products as a trader at a prop shop. lol. you'll be trading, and will be using leverage. Best of luck OP!
 
Quote from psytrade:

It says you live in California... I would read Steven Drobny's books.... Inside the house of money, and his latest, Invisible Hands....

Figure out an edge and try and get into a SO CAL Macro fund....

I would skip the pure day trading route advocated here.... too easy to blow up, and you sound like you aren't well capitalized....

The macro research route in spite of you having no economics / business background might be facilitated by a social / biological science perspective...

Also look into something like risk management, Series 3,55,66,7, ---> CTA paths to get into that world.

The reason I mention the 2 books above, is its a kind of modern Market Wizards... in several interviews, it describes the career paths of people whom often had zero formal training in economics or trading but became rich from their hands on experience....

Also consider applying to places like Cargill, Koch Industries, etc.... US firms with a heavy trading component to them.
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OUTSTANDING post!
 
Quote from nazzdack:

1) (Must make sure my "caps lock" key is off.....okay.) :eek:
2) To be a stockbroker is incompatible with being a trader. Don't ever talk about trading during an interview for a stockbroker sponsorship. :(
3) Be willing to put a reasonable amount of time, i.e. 6 to12 months, into getting something. If nothing works out, just focus on trading. It's the wrong part of the decade to be a "career switcher". Good luck with it. :cool:
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Why do you think it's the wrong part of the decade to be a "career switcher" ? I am assuming that finding a job as a trader is always going to be very difficult regardless of the economy.
 
Quote from fogut:

Why do you think it's the wrong part of the decade to be a "career switcher" ? I am assuming that finding a job as a trader is always going to be very difficult regardless of the economy.
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Finding a job as a trader isn't very hard if you're really committed to finding a seat on a desk (the hard part is keeping that seat)....with the OPs credentials his best options are:
- true prop desks (they capitalize you and offer guidance)
- retail desks (you capitalize and they lever you)

I can identify with the OP b/c in college I discovered that I wanted to be a trader during my junior year after losing money on Forbes recommendations and then an exhaustive research of the stock market that guided me from Warren Buffett to William O'Neil. Trouble was, I was on track for a psych B.A. w/ a minor in writing and that is not what banks or HFs are looking for. Rather than just accepting that as the truth, I had the audacity to locate the most successful turtle trader's hedge fund in my hometown (Jerry Parker) and I walked up to their door in all my splendor with a bookbag on and rang the doorbell to gain entrance. The camera in the corner seemed like it examined me forever. They eventually buzzed me in. I had brought all of my research results (not to impress them with anything groundbreaking but to demonstrate my work ethic) and I was introduced to someone from HR (I hadn't graduated yet). He explained to me that they did not need discretionary traders and they didn't offer internships either. Although they were impressed by my audacity, the only thing they could offer me was good luck.

After that experience I assumed the same thing would occur with banks and other HFs. As I neared grad, I assumed that I would have to become a broker until I grew my capital enough on my own to quit and trade independently. I had never heard of prop trading of any capacity. One day I stumbled across a random prop firm online (Opus Atlanta) and it looked good --- so I applied. In the following weeks I located many other prop firms on the internet and researched and applied to EACH one of them--geographic location be damned(about 24 or so in all---and I didn't send identical cover letters to each of them btw. I looked at what I liked about the firm if I could find anything that I did like.). I did have my top picks and the other picks that I would go with if all else failed. Retail props (props in disguise) were naturally the first to respond (Hold Brothers, TUCO, etc...).

True prop trading suited me then b/c I didn't have much capital. However if I hadn't been extended an opportunity for true prop I would've worked a job to obtain the initial deposit at a retail-prop and taken that (much more arduous) route. Eventually I was lucky enough to receive an opportunity from my top choice and I am still with the same firm almost 4 years later. I said that all just to say that if you're persistent, regardless of your credentials, you can find an opportunity as a real trader (unless you're like 35 years old trying to change careers -- then it will be much more difficult).
 
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