Quote from FaderTrader:
Goldman moved to Jersey City because the city only gave them a portion of the tax breaks they were insisting on. I doubt you have such a high-class problem.
My issue with Bright is that I think you are preying on losers by saying that you aren't. You are requiring more upfront capital and getting complete newbies into thousands of shares. How does that preserve capital?
Don, that's just plain reckless and misleading. Please debate the logical of:
Requiring more capital in order to get people into more shares of stock in order to pump up commissions while they are there. A trading firm cannot make a trader trade successfully. So, it logically follows that such a firm should seek to maximize commission revenue while the trader is trading. This is accomplished by requiring more money in order to give them more BP, in order to collect more commission on bigger (albeit still reckless) trades.
You recognize that undercapitalization is an achilles heel - but what about newbies getting into too much size?
I spoke on the phone with you for 30 seconds about a year ago - and after 10 seconds, you made clear to me that 1 million in BP would not be a problem. You had no knowledge of my experience whatsoever.
Seems pretty transparent to me.
I can certainly debate with you, it's quite simple. Working strategies require considerable buying power, as mentioned before. Opening only, Pairs, M&A, etc. are LOWER RISK/HIGHER REWARD than simple 300 share gambling done by most "newbies" ..."picking stocks" on a daily basis is very high risk, where becoming a "surrogate specialist" in a couple of stocks, trading them all the time, works well (it has in NYC for 2 hundred years)...again Lower Risk, Higher reward.
There is no push for shares, we are adding a couple of hundred new traders who will likely never trade over 200,000 shares per month...so I doubt we "push" anything in that regard...we simply adjust pricing to reflect our deal with GS.
Regarding your phone call, I am perfectly open and up front with everyone, and sure I probably did tell you that using a $mil or more is no problem, because or the right strategies, I let brand new College kids (using our money) use that much in our internship programs, why would I not think an "experienced" trader could handle that much.
Under capitalization is always a problem, but not as bad as not having enough BP to engage in proper, winning strategies. Seems silly to compound the problem, doesn't it?
So, adequate capital and adequate BP seems like the best way to engage in trading for a living. "Newbies" at BT are usually successful people who have done well in other professions, are usually adult business people, and they trade the share size they choose...that seems pretty obvious to me.
Regarding GS....they simply paid our rent in NYC because they had room so spare from some layoffs due to the SLK takeover, I'll ignore the "high class" comment, LOL.
Now let's hear about your firm's policies...give the other readers a rest from BT for while, LOL.
Don