"I was poor, then I became rich, then I was poor again"
- Thread starter Pekelo
- Start date
His very successful, never blown up brother talks a lot in part 5, unfortunately the voice over is too loud to be able to hear him.
It is amazing he was able to keep the house after 1997. It is little known but he actually blew up at least 3 times, 2001 and 2007 being the other two. In the first video he was surprisingly humble, that is why I posted it. If you fast forward through the other 8 parts, there are about another 10 minutes of him talking without voice over... His grandpa also blew up in 1929.
It is amazing he was able to keep the house after 1997. It is little known but he actually blew up at least 3 times, 2001 and 2007 being the other two. In the first video he was surprisingly humble, that is why I posted it. If you fast forward through the other 8 parts, there are about another 10 minutes of him talking without voice over... His grandpa also blew up in 1929.
Yes, it was the narcissism that struck me when I read his book. If memory serves, it is almost as though he was paying homage to himself. Even in the video in this thread, some of his humility is couched in humblebrag.
To be fair, his nature has served him well for a time and he has made more money in his life than I ever will. But his disrespect for risk was also the seed of his destruction. His need for attention and to stand out and be different (exhibit one: the look-at-me pastel-colored clothes) could possibly explain his propensity to doggedly trade against a prevailing trend. He may have espoused testing everything that could be tested, but an inflated ego evidently made him that much more vulnerable to confirmation bias. So, depending on the level of ego, even an otherwise smart guy can convince himself to do stupid stuff and blame a previous blow-up on an anomaly.
So just as the difference between medicine and poison can be in the dosage, confidence is a good thing but hubris kills.
I suppose it's easy being an armchair quarterback/psychologist. If it were difficult, I wouldn't have posted.
His peer group is Soros, Druckenmiller, Rogers all guys fabulously successful thus he tried too hard to be like them and pushed the envelope too far...
Victor is an academic researcher as well and he has published a number of journals. So he had a reason to believe he was going to be successful and took risky bets. His main research area is more related to technical analysis - the probability based trading something like price clustering on round numbers. So his focus was less on fundamental side.
I can speak some Japanese but if you see the youtube there is CC - which provides subtitles. Change the subtitle option from Japanese to English and then it will show english subtitles. Hope this helps
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It seems like blowing up after being up big is all to common. Those that claw their way back up from blowing up often seem to go the distance. I blew up after thinking I was set for life - nothing worse than wearing a name tag at a lowly paying job to get a 3 digit paycheck every 2 weeks after having had 5 digit up days only a year prior. You always know no matter how poor you are that if you did it once you can do it again - so you grind your way up and make a trading plan that has a serious risk mgmt strategy.
He appears very humble in the video.
I recall reading his blog in 2006/2007 and he posted very arrogant and scathing comments about the 'dumb bears' and the 'housing crisis tinfoil heads'. He blew up in the summer of 2007, even before the whole storm of the financial crisis was unleashed.
I recall reading his blog in 2006/2007 and he posted very arrogant and scathing comments about the 'dumb bears' and the 'housing crisis tinfoil heads'. He blew up in the summer of 2007, even before the whole storm of the financial crisis was unleashed.
OK, I never used this feature and took a little tinkering, but finally it worked, thanks for the idea. Here is how to set it up:
1. Choose CC in the lower right corner or there should be subtitles already on.
2. At Settings next to CC choose Subtitles> Japanese >Auto-Translate>English (or whatever)
Then you can watch the whole 8 episodes with English subtitles... If you screw the settings up, you have to reload the video and start again, it didn't let me change it without reloading...
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About blowing up: People get addicted to success and great returns, and they also start to buy into their own hubris. Lots of times they have the right strategy for the right time (buying tech stocks in the late 90s, and you thought you were a genius), but when times change they are not able to adjust, or come up with a new strategy...
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All of these type trading success stories seem to end the same way; with the so-called star trader blowing up
The key is to stop searching for a relatively temporary strategy that only works in given certain market conditions only
The Holy Grail is in simplicity: KISS...keep it simple, stupid -- and Simplicity doesn't have to mean safe, steady and small returns.
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I disagree. Whatever works, if it works for the time being, it is fine. Buffett didn't take advantage of the roaring 90s, and that was a mistake. As long as the trader realizes that the strategy isn't forever, there is nothing wrong with strategies being temporary. You just have to watch when the signs are signaling the end of usefulness and switch, or at least stop using the unprofitable method.
The biggest lessons are though: Don't buy into your own hubris. Nobody is infallible. Nothing works forever....