“
Babcock silenced himself when he caught a gratifying sight on the broker’s shelf—his finance book, Moving Ones and Zeros Around like a Goddamn God!
”
”
Jasun Ether (The Beasts of Success)
“
Babcock fidgeted with one of his cufflinks while staring down the remaining brokers in his office. He then delivered something akin to a pep talk in a severe tone. "... The world depends on our services. Services that must not be impeded. We don't break our backs producing things that have no real value—food, shelter, clothes ... art. No! We're titans of finance. We move intangible things and ideas around the world on digital platforms. No one else in the world can accumulate as much wealth as we do by simply moving around one and zeros on computers.
”
”
Jasun Ether (The Beasts of Success)
“
With an evening coat and a white tie, as you told me once, anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain a reputation for being civilized.
”
”
Oscar Wilde (The Picture of Dorian Gray)
“
The broker said the stock was "poised to move." Silly me, I thought he meant up.
”
”
Randy Thurman
“
that each ejaculation contains several billion sperm cells –or roughly the same number as there are people in the world– which means that, in himself, each man holds the potential of an entire world. And what would happen, could it happen, is the full range of possibilities: a spawn of idiots and geniuses, of the beautiful and the deformed, of saints, catatonics, thieves, stock brokers, and high-wire artists. Each man, therefore, is the entire world, bearing within his genes a memory of all mankind. Or, as Leibniz put it: “Every living substance is a perpetual living mirror of the universe.
”
”
Paul Auster (The Invention of Solitude)
“
Fifteen years ago, this would have been insider trading, but that quaint concept had disappeared a decade or two ago when so many brokers were doing it that it was impossible to jail them all. Now it was called smart trading.
”
”
Max Barry (Jennifer Government)
“
Money in a broker’s account or in a bank account is not the same as if you feel it in your own fingers once in a while. Then it means something.
”
”
Jesse Livermore (How to Trade In Stocks)
“
It had come back to him simply that what he had been looking at all summer was a very rich and beautiful world, and that it had not all been made by sharp railroad men and stock-brokers.
”
”
Henry James (The American)
“
Anne looked disapproval, but she felt she had entrusted her hundred pounds to the right sort of stock broker.
”
”
E.M. Forster (Maurice)
“
Why do we say, “That’s true for you but not for me,” when we’re talking about morality or religion, but we never even think of such nonsense when we’re talking to a stock broker about our money or a doctor about our health?
”
”
Norman L. Geisler (I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist)
“
Human nature is a strange mixture, Watson. You see that even a villain and murderer can inspire such affection that his brother turns to suicide when he learns that his neck is forfeited.
”
”
Arthur Conan Doyle
“
Dark pools were another rogue spawn of the new financial marketplace. Private stock exchanges, run by the big brokers, they were not required to reveal to the public what happened inside them. They reported any trade they executed, but they did so with sufficient delay that it was impossible to know exactly what was happening in the broader market at the moment the trade occurred.
”
”
Michael Lewis (Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt)
“
With an evening coat and a white tie, as you told me once, anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain a reputation for being civilized. Well, after I had been in the room about ten minutes, talking to huge overdressed dowagers and tedious academicians, I suddenly became conscious that some one was looking at me.
”
”
Oscar Wilde (The Picture of Dorian Gray)
“
And in what business is there not humbug? “There’s cheating in all trades but ours,” is the prompt reply from the boot-maker with his brown paper soles, the grocer with his floury sugar and chicoried coffee, the butcher with his mysterious sausages and queer veal, the dry goods man with his “damaged goods wet at the great fire” and his “selling at a ruinous loss,” the stock-broker with his brazen assurance that your company is bankrupt and your stock not worth a cent (if he wants to buy it,) the horse jockey with his black arts and spavined brutes, the milkman with his tin aquaria, the land agent with his nice new maps and beautiful descriptions of distant scenery, the newspaper man with his “immense circulation,” the publisher with his “Great American Novel,” the city auctioneer with his “Pictures by the Old Masters”—all and every one protest each his own innocence, and warn you against the deceits of the rest. My inexperienced friend, take it for granted that they all tell the truth—about each other! and then transact your business to the best of your ability on your own judgment.
”
”
P.T. Barnum (The Humbugs of the World: An Account of Humbugs, Delusions, Impositions, Quackeries, Deceits and Deceivers Generally, in All Ages)
“
When you buy a stock, you buy a piece of business, not a quote from a broker. As long as the company is doing good, your investment is safe.
”
”
Naved Abdali
“
Nearly all (95 percent) of the millionaires we surveyed own stocks; most have 20 percent or more of their wealth in publicly traded stocks. Yet you would be wrong to assume that these millionaires actively trade their stocks. Most don’t follow the ups and downs of the market day by day. Most don’t call their stock brokers each morning to ask how the London market did. Most don’t trade stocks in response to daily headlines in the financial media. Do
”
”
Thomas J. Stanley (The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America's Wealthy)
“
Have you ever seen, your broker offering any investment idea that is for 2-3 years holding period? They can’t offer because their broking business will dry up if you buy today and hold them for 2-3 year. On the contrary, wealth can only be created over the long run.
”
”
Prasenjit Paul (How to Avoid Loss and Earn Consistently in the Stock Market: An Easy-To-Understand and Practical Guide for Every Investor)
“
A trader, in addition to studying basic conditions, remembering market precedents and keeping in mind the psychology of the outside public as well as the limitations of his brokers, must also know himself and provide against his own weaknesses. There is no need to feel anger over being human.
”
”
Edwin Lefèvre (REMINISCENCES OF A STOCK OPERATOR)
“
The less transparent the market and the more complicated the securities, the more money the trading desks at big Wall Street firms can make from the argument. The constant argument over the value of the shares of some major publicly traded company has very little value, as both buyer and seller can see the fair price of the stock on the ticker, and the broker’s commission has been driven down by competition. The argument over the value of credit default swaps on subprime mortgage bonds—a complex security whose value was derived from that of another complex security—could be a gold mine.
”
”
Michael Lewis (The Big Short)
“
In the Middle Ages the outbreak of a plague caused people to raise their eyes towards heaven, and pray to God to forgive them for their sins. Today when people hear of some deadly new epidemic, they reach for their mobile phones and call their brokers. For the stock exchange, even an epidemic is a business opportunity. If enough new ventures succeed, people’s trust in the future increases, credit expands, interest rates fall, entrepreneurs can raise money more easily and the economy grows.
”
”
Yuval Noah Harari (Homo Deus: ‘An intoxicating brew of science, philosophy and futurism’ Mail on Sunday)
“
To the enormous majority of persons who risk themselves in literature, not even the smallest measure of success can fall. They had better take to some other profession as quickly as may be, they are only making a sure thing of disappointment, only crowding the narrow gates of fortune and fame. Yet there are others to whom success, though easily within their reach, does not seem a thing to be grasped at. Of two such, the pathetic story may be read, in the Memoir of A Scotch Probationer, Mr. Thomas Davidson, who died young, an unplaced Minister of the United Presbyterian Church, in 1869. He died young, unaccepted by the world, unheard of, uncomplaining, soon after writing his latest song on the first grey hairs of the lady whom he loved. And she, Miss Alison Dunlop, died also, a year ago, leaving a little work newly published, Anent Old Edinburgh, in which is briefly told the story of her life. There can hardly be a true tale more brave and honourable, for those two were eminently qualified to shine, with a clear and modest radiance, in letters. Both had a touch of poetry, Mr. Davidson left a few genuine poems, both had humour, knowledge, patience, industry, and literary conscientiousness. No success came to them, they did not even seek it, though it was easily within the reach of their powers. Yet none can call them failures, leaving, as they did, the fragrance of honourable and uncomplaining lives, and such brief records of these as to delight, and console and encourage us all. They bequeath to us the spectacle of a real triumph far beyond the petty gains of money or of applause, the spectacle of lives made happy by literature, unvexed by notoriety, unfretted by envy. What we call success could never have yielded them so much, for the ways of authorship are dusty and stony, and the stones are only too handy for throwing at the few that, deservedly or undeservedly, make a name, and therewith about one-tenth of the wealth which is ungrudged to physicians, or barristers, or stock-brokers, or dentists, or electricians. If literature and occupation with letters were not its own reward, truly they who seem to succeed might envy those who fail. It is not wealth that they win, as fortunate men in other professions count wealth; it is not rank nor fashion that come to their call nor come to call on them. Their success is to be let dwell with their own fancies, or with the imaginations of others far greater than themselves; their success is this living in fantasy, a little remote from the hubbub and the contests of the world. At the best they will be vexed by curious eyes and idle tongues, at the best they will die not rich in this world’s goods, yet not unconsoled by the friendships which they win among men and women whose faces they will never see. They may well be content, and thrice content, with their lot, yet it is not a lot which should provoke envy, nor be coveted by ambition.
”
”
Andrew Lang (How to Fail in Literature: A Lecture)
“
Amazon made its first 10x improvement in a particularly visible way: they offered at least 10 times as many books as any other bookstore. When it launched in 1995, Amazon could claim to be “Earth’s largest bookstore” because, unlike a retail bookstore that might stock 100,000 books, Amazon didn’t need to physically store any inventory—it simply requested the title from its supplier whenever a customer made an order. This quantum improvement was so effective that a very unhappy Barnes & Noble filed a lawsuit three days before Amazon’s IPO, claiming that Amazon was unfairly calling itself a “bookstore” when really it was a “book broker.
”
”
Peter Thiel (Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future)
“
A 1997 study of the consumer product design firm IDEO found that most of the company’s biggest successes originated as “combinations of existing knowledge from disparate industries.” IDEO’s designers created a top-selling water bottle, for example, by mixing a standard water carafe with the leak-proof nozzle of a shampoo container. The power of combining old ideas in new ways also extends to finance, where the prices of stock derivatives are calculated by mixing formulas originally developed to describe the motion of dust particles with gambling techniques. Modern bike helmets exist because a designer wondered if he could take a boat’s hull, which can withstand nearly any collision, and design it in the shape of a hat. It even reaches to parenting, where one of the most popular baby books—Benjamin Spock’s The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care, first published in 1946—combined Freudian psychotherapy with traditional child-rearing techniques. “A lot of the people we think of as exceptionally creative are essentially intellectual middlemen,” said Uzzi. “They’ve learned how to transfer knowledge between different industries or groups. They’ve seen a lot of different people attack the same problems in different settings, and so they know which kinds of ideas are more likely to work.” Within sociology, these middlemen are often referred to as idea or innovation brokers. In one study published in 2004, a sociologist named Ronald Burt studied 673 managers at a large electronics company and found that ideas that were most consistently ranked as “creative” came from people who were particularly talented at taking concepts from one division of the company and explaining them to employees in other departments. “People connected across groups are more familiar with alternative ways of thinking and behaving,” Burt wrote. “The between-group brokers are more likely to express ideas, less likely to have ideas dismissed, and more likely to have ideas evaluated as valuable.” They were more credible when they made suggestions, Burt said, because they could say which ideas had already succeeded somewhere else.
”
”
Charles Duhigg (Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business)
“
A beautiful example of a long-term intention was presented by A. T. Ariyaratane, a Buddhist elder, who is considered to be the Gandhi of Sri Lanka. For seventeen years there had been a terrible civil war in Sri Lanka. At one point, the Norwegians were able to broker peace, and once the peace treaty was in effect, Ariyaratane called the followers of his Sarvodaya movement together. Sarvodaya combines Buddhist principles of right livelihood, right action, right understanding, and compassion and has organized citizens in one-third of that nation’s villages to dig wells, build schools, meditate, and collaborate as a form of spiritual practice. Over 650,000 people came to the gathering to hear how he envisioned the future of Sri Lanka. At this gathering he proposed a five-hundred-year peace plan, saying, “The Buddha teaches we must understand causes and conditions. It’s taken us five hundred years to create the suffering that we are in now.” Ari described the effects of four hundred years of colonialism, of five hundred years of struggle between Hindus, Muslims, and Buddhists, and of several centuries of economic disparity. He went on, “It will take us five hundred years to change these conditions.” Ariyaratane then offered solutions, proposing a plan to heal the country. The plan begins with five years of cease-fire and ten years of rebuilding roads and schools. Then it goes on for twenty-five years of programs to learn one another’s languages and cultures, and fifty years of work to right economic injustice, and to bring the islanders back together as a whole. And every hundred years there will be a grand council of elders to take stock on how the plan is going. This is a sacred intention, the long-term vision of an elder. In the same way, if we envision the fulfillment of wisdom and compassion in the United States, it becomes clear that the richest nation on earth must provide health care for its children; that the most productive nation on earth must find ways to combine trade with justice; that a creative society must find ways to grow and to protect the environment and plan sustainable development for generations ahead. A nation founded on democracy must bring enfranchisement to all citizens at home and then offer the same spirit of international cooperation and respect globally. We are all in this together.
”
”
Jack Kornfield (Bringing Home the Dharma: Awakening Right Where You Are)
“
What ensued was a game of Coyote and Roadrunner that dragged on for more than a decade. Sixty letters went back and forth among Beaumont, St. Martin, and various contacts at the American Fur Company who had located St. Martin and tried to broker a return. It was a seller’s market with a fevered buyer. With each new round of communications—St. Martin holding out for more or making excuses, though always politely and with “love to your family”—Beaumont raised his offer: $250 a year, with an additional $50 to relocate the wife and five children (“his live stock,” as Beaumont at one point refers to them). Perhaps a government pension and a piece of land? His final plan was to offer St. Martin $500 a year if he’d leave his family behind, at which point Beaumont planned to unfurl some unspecified trickery: “When I get him alone again into my keeping I will take good care to control him as I please.” But St. Martin—beep, beep!—eluded his grasp. In the end, Beaumont died first. When a colleague, years later, set out to bag the fabled stomach for study and museum display, St. Martin’s survivors sent a cable that must have given pause to the telegraph operator: “Don’t come for autopsy, will be killed.
”
”
Mary Roach (Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal)
“
The fragility of the US economy had nearly destroyed him. It wasn't enough that Citadel's walls were as strong and impenetrable as the name implied; the economy itself needed to be just as solid.
Over the next decade, he endeavored to place Citadel at the center of the equity markets, using his company's superiority in math and technology to tie trading to information flow. Citadel Securities, the trading and market-making division of his company, which he'd founded back in 2003, grew by leaps and bounds as he took advantage of his 'algorithmic'-driven abilities to read 'ahead of the market.' Because he could predict where trades were heading faster and better than anyone else, he could outcompete larger banks for trading volume, offering better rates while still capturing immense profits on the spreads between buys and sells. In 2005, the SEC had passed regulations that forced brokers to seek out middlemen like Citadel who could provide the most savings to their customers; in part because of this move by the SEC, Ken's outfit was able to grow into the most effective, and thus dominant, middleman for trading — and especially for retail traders, who were proliferating in tune to the numerous online brokerages sprouting up in the decade after 2008.
Citadel Securities reached scale before the bigger banks even knew what had hit them; and once Citadel was at scale, it became impossible for anyone else to compete. Citadel's efficiency, and its ability to make billions off the minute spreads between bids and asks — multiplied by millions upon millions of trades — made companies like Robinhood, with its zero fees, possible. Citadel could profit by being the most efficient and cheapest market maker on the Street. Robinhood could profit by offering zero fees to its users. And the retail traders, on their couches and in their kitchens and in their dorm rooms, profited because they could now trade stocks with the same tools as their Wall Street counterparts.
”
”
Ben Mezrich (The Antisocial Network: The GameStop Short Squeeze and the Ragtag Group of Amateur Traders That Brought Wall Street to Its Knees)
“
Icahn’s first experience with a Wall Street boom-to-bust cycle was certainly a disappointment, but it also taught him two lessons he never forgot. First, no one makes money playing the market. A small investor dabbling in stocks is always vulnerable to bigger, more powerful forces that time after time will wipe him out. Second, if he was going to emerge as a dominant force, he needed more than a broker’s training. He had to gain expertise in a market niche overlooked by the hordes of brokers content to sit by the phone and take orders. His study of empiricism had taught him that “there is a strategy behind everything,” and now he had to determine what that strategy was.
”
”
Mark Stevens (King Icahn: The Biography of a Renegade Capitalist)
“
State Senator Kemble made a speech opposing any enlargement of the NY&H’s capital. When the news of impending scarcity hit Wall Street, the price of Harlem stock rose. At the top of the market, Kemble’s broker sold short. Kemble then pushed a bill through the legislature enlarging Harlem’s capital, and the price plummeted. As these were early days, and such behavior was still considered inappropriate, Kemble was expelled from the Senate.
”
”
Edwin G. Burrows (Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898)
“
A broker was expected to find the best possible price in the market for his customer. The Goldman Sachs dark pool—to take one example—was less than 2 percent of the entire stock market. So why did nearly 50 percent of the customer orders routed into Goldman’s dark pool end up being executed inside that pool—rather than out in the wider market? Most of the brokers’ dark pools constituted less than 1 percent of the entire market, and yet somehow those brokers found the best price for their customers between 15 and 60 percent of the time.
”
”
Anonymous
“
Senior managers at the Royal Bank of Canada were now arguing that the bank should create a Canadian dark pool, route their Canadian customers’ stock market orders into it, and then sell to high-frequency traders the right to operate inside the dark pool. Brad thought that it made a lot more sense for RBC simply to expose the new game for what it was, and perhaps establish themselves as the only broker on Wall Street not conspiring to screw investors. “The only card left to play was honesty,” as Rob Park put it.
”
”
Michael Lewis (Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt)
“
An old Wall Street joke gets close to our experience: Customer: Thanks for putting me in XYZ stock at 5. I hear it’s up to 18. Broker: Yes, and that’s just the beginning. In fact, the company is doing so well now, that it’s an even better buy at 18 than it was when you made your purchase. Customer: Damn, I knew I should have waited.
”
”
Mark Gavagan (Gems from Warren Buffett: Wit and Wisdom from 34 Years of Letters to Shareholders)
“
They had a much more fundamental problem with the market: greed. Market motives were held to be inherently corrupt. The moment that greed was validated and unlimited profit was considered a perfectly viable end in itself, this political, magical element became a genuine problem, because it meant that even those actors—the brokers, stock-jobbers, traders—who effectively made the system run had no convincing loyalty to anything, even to the system itself.
”
”
David Graeber (Debt: The First 5,000 Years)
“
A brand-new, highly effective anti-flu drug that had potential for massive sales. With the new bird flu scare, Merwyn stood to make a bundle off of the ensuing panic. With a 98 percent profit margin and skyrocketing demand, Merwyn couldn’t lose. Andrew alone stood to make millions in stock options and bonus incentives for brokering the deal. It was like a dream come true: the global spread of the avian flu virus, millions infected, a few hundred thousand dead and millions more taking Preva-Flu by the $80 packet.
”
”
Theresa MacPhail (The Eye of the Virus)
“
brokers include Charles Schwab, Interactive Brokers, TD Ameritrade, TradeStation, Fidelity, and E*Trade.
”
”
Matthew R. Kratter (A Beginner's Guide to the Stock Market)
“
Exactly!” you shot back, finishing your last pattern. “The stock really is a screaming buy down here!” Then you pause for a brief instant and switch to your mystery and intrigue tonality, and you say, “Now, Bill, let me ask you another question.” And now you switch to your money-aside tonality. “If I’d been your broker for the last three or four years, making you money on a consistent basis”—and now you switch to your implied obviousness—“then you probably wouldn’t be saying, ‘Let me think about it right now, [your first name].’ You’d be saying, ‘Pick me up a block of at least a few thousand shares.’” And then you switch to the reasonable man tone and you add, “Am I right?
”
”
Jordan Belfort (Way of the Wolf: Straight line selling: Master the art of persuasion, influence, and success)
“
When the price is going lower, you owe 100 shares to your broker (it probably shows as -100 shares in your account), which means you must return 100 shares of Apple to your broker. Your broker doesn’t want your money; they want their shares back.
”
”
AMS Publishing Group (Intelligent Stock Market Trading and Investment: Quick and Easy Guide to Stock Market Investment for Absolute Beginners)
“
to $10, $20, or $100, and still there will be no limit to your loss. Your broker wants those shares back. Not only can you lose all of the money in your account, but your broker can also sue
”
”
AMS Publishing Group (Intelligent Stock Market Trading and Investment: Quick and Easy Guide to Stock Market Investment for Absolute Beginners)
“
The same is done with stocks. Frequently, my broker calls and recommends I move a sizable amount of money into the stock of a company that he feels is just about to make a move that will add value to the stock, like announcing a new product. I will move my money in for a week to a month while the stock moves up. Then I pull my initial dollar amount out, and stop worrying about the fluctuations of the market, because my initial money is back and ready to work on another asset. So my money goes in, and then it comes out, and I own an asset that was technically free.
”
”
Robert T. Kiyosaki (Rich Dad Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not!)
“
But few gain sufficient experience in Wall Street to command sucess until they reach that period of life in which they have one foot in the grave. When this time comes these old veterans of the Street usually spend long intervals of repose at their comfortable homes, and in times of panic, which recur sometimes oftener than once a year, these old fellows will be seen in Wall Street, hobbling down on their canes to their brokers' office.
Then they always buy good stocks to the extent of their bank balances, which have been permitted to accumulate for just such an emergency. The panic usually rages until enough of these cash purchases of stock is made to afford a big "rake in." When the panic has spent its force, these old fellows, who have been resting judiciously on their oars in expectation of the inevitable event, which usually returns with the regularity of the seasons, quickly realize, deposit their profits with their bankers, or the overplus thereof, after purchasing more real estate that is on the upgrade, for permanent investment, and retire for another season to the quietude of their splendid homes and the bosoms of their happy families.
If young men had only the patience to watch the speculative signs of the times, as manifested in the periodical egress of these old prophetic speculators from their shells of security, they would make more money at these intervals than by following up the slippery "tips" of the professional "pointers" of the Stock Exchange all the year round, and they would feel no necessity for hanging at the coat tails, around the hotels, of those specious frauds, who pretend to be deep in the councils of the big operations and of all the new "pools" in process of formation. I say to the young speculators, therefore, watch the ominous visits to the Street of these old men. They are as certain to be seen on the eve of a panic as spiders creeping stealthily and noiselessly from their cobwebs just before rain.
”
”
Henry Clews (Fifty Years in Wall Street (Wiley Investment Classics))
“
On Wall Street, brokers called the dependable AT&T a “widows-and-orphans” stock; if you couldn’t rely on anyone else, you could rely on Ma Bell. The paradox, of course, was that a parent corporation so dull, so cautious, so predictable was also in custody of a lab so innovative. “Few companies are more conservative,” Time magazine said about AT&T, “none are more creative.
”
”
Jon Gertner (The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation)
“
There was also a feeling of release. That was another part of it. To go on his way: north to a new land. He felt the tingle of anticipation. 'Not a whore or a stock broker within 500 miles,' he said aloud and grinned. He gave up trying to find words for his feeling. Emotion was so damned elusive: as soon as you cornered it, it changed its shape and the net of words which you had ready to throw over it was no longer suitable. He let it go free to range through his body, accepting and enjoying it. He ran down the stairs, out through the kitchens and into the stableyard.
”
”
Wilbur Smith (When the Lion Feeds (Courtney publication, #1; Courtney chronological, #10))
“
Though many details of these schemes are either complex or not yet public knowledge, one of the mechanisms is. Some exchanges, such as NASDAQ, let HF traders peek at customer orders ahead of everyone else for thirty milliseconds before the order goes to the exchange. Seeing an order to buy, for instance, the HF traders can buy first, pushing the stock price up, then resell to the customer at a profit. Seeing someone’s order to sell, the HF trader sells first, causing the stock to fall, and then buys it back at the lower price. How is this different from the crime of front-running, described in Wikipedia as “the illegal practice of a stock broker executing orders on a security for its own account while taking advantage of advance knowledge of pending orders from its customers”?
”
”
Edward O. Thorp (A Man for All Markets: From Las Vegas to Wall Street, How I Beat the Dealer and the Market)
“
Busy During the Day? Set Automatic Trade Triggers If you work during the day and can’t watch the market, you can set “conditional orders” ahead of time with your broker. It can be a great way to catch a big breakout—even as you’re plugging away at your day job. And when you’re on vacation and can’t watch your stocks closely, you also can set conditional sell orders to lock in your gains or cut short any losses if the stock declines.
”
”
Matthew Galgani (How to Make Money in Stocks Getting Started: A Guide to Putting CAN SLIM Concepts into Action)
“
Financial advisors have a fiduciary duty to correctly document your age, income, savings, financial experience, and risk assessment. They are required not to match conservative investors with risky investments and to make their clients aware of the difference. This is the main point of contention on Broker-Dealer Sales Representative complaints for arbitration.
”
”
Phillip B. Chute (Stocks, Bonds & Taxes: A Comprehensive Handbook and Investment Guide for Everybody)
“
Options and forwards are traded on all kinds of financial instruments, including stocks, bonds, and various market indices. Some are traded on organized exchanges throughout the world. Others are traded only in privately negotiated transactions, called over-the-counter, or OTC. Exchange-traded derivatives are more highly regulated, more liquid, and more dependable than OTC derivatives. To get information about an exchange-traded derivative, you can simply look in the Wall Street Journal or call a broker. In contrast, you might never be able to discover certain information about an OTC derivative unless you worked in the derivatives group at an investment bank.
”
”
Frank Partnoy (FIASCO: Blood in the Water on Wall Street)
“
In 1948, the year when the Land camera appeared in late November, Polaroid took in $1.48 million. A decade later, it had grown to $89 million in sales; ten years after that, in 1969, it was nearing half a billion. Even as the press kept saying “the stock is overvalued,” it kept going up. After rising almost nonstop through the fifties, it split 4-for-1 in 1964, and split again in 1968. It became a glamour purchase, and even against the advice of some of their brokers, people kept buying shares.
”
”
Christopher Bonanos (Instant: The Story of Polaroid)
“
In so many respects, the Trade Center dead formed a kind of universal parliament, representing 62 countries and nearly every ethnic group and religion in the world. There was an ex-hippie stock broker, the gay Catholic chaplain of the New York City Fire Department, a Japanese hockey player, an Ecuadorian sous chef, a Barbie doll collector, a vegetarian calligrapher, a Palestinian accountant. The manifold ways in which they attached to life testified to the Quranic injunction: that the taking of a single life destroys a universe.
”
”
Lawrence Wright
“
Stock brokers, and investment salesmen (few women were allowed back then) could only give “advice” on an investment transaction if it were “solely incidental” to the sales transaction. “Solely incidental” was (and still is) the term found in the US Securities law (Sec 202, INVESTMENT ADVISERS ACT OF 1940) that legislated the responsibilities in the industry. In loose terms it meant that the broker (salesperson) was not able to give advice, unless it was of such minor proportions as to be “solely incidental to the conduct of his business as a broker…
”
”
Larry Elford (Farming Humans: Easy Money (Non Fiction Financial Murder Book 1))
“
Why do you suppose the brokers on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange always cheer at the sound of the closing bell—no matter what the market did that day? Because whenever you trade, they make money—whether you did or not.
”
”
Benjamin Graham (The Intelligent Investor)
“
These low-cost “ETFs” sometimes offer the only means by which an investor can gain entrée to a narrow market like, say, companies based in Belgium or stocks in the semiconductor industry. Other index ETFs offer much broader market exposure. However, they are generally not suitable for investors who wish to add money regularly, since most brokers will charge a separate commission on every new investment you make.
”
”
Benjamin Graham (The Intelligent Investor)
“
In fact, the Federal Reserve was helpless only because it wanted to be. Had it been determined to do something, it could for example have asked Congress for authority to halt trading on margin by granting the Board the power to set margin requirements. Margins were not low in 1929; a residue of caution had caused most brokers to require customers to put up in cash 45 to 50 per cent of the value of the stocks they were buying. However, this was all the cash numerous of their customers had.
”
”
John Kenneth Galbraith (The Great Crash 1929)
“
Legg Mason was a value shop, and its training program emphasized the classic works on value investing, including Benjamin Graham and David Dodd’s Security Analysis and Graham’s The Intelligent Investor. Each day, the firm’s veteran brokers would stop by and share their insights on stocks and the market. They handed us a Value Line Investment Survey of their favorite stock. Each company possessed the same attributes: a low price-to-earnings ratio, a low price-to-book ratio, and a high dividend yield. More often than not, the company was also deeply out of favor with the market, as evidenced by the long period the stock had underperformed the market. Over and over again, we were told to avoid the high-flying popular growth stocks and instead focus on the downtrodden, where the risk-reward ratio was much more favorable.
”
”
Robert G. Hagstrom (The Warren Buffett Way)
“
When I said to my broker, “Write a naked put option,” I was saying, “I want to sell options on stock I do not own.
”
”
Robert T. Kiyosaki (Retire Young Retire Rich: How to Get Rich Quickly and Stay Rich Forever! (Rich Dad's (Paperback)))
“
The wealth effect is one pillar supporting the Fed’s zero-interest-rate policy and profligate money printing since 2008. The transmission channels are easy to follow. If rates are low, more Americans can afford mortgages, which increases home buying, resulting in higher prices for homes. Similarly, with low rates, brokers offer cheap margin loans to clients, which result in more stock buying and higher stock prices.
”
”
James Rickards (The Death of Money: The Coming Collapse of the International Monetary System)
“
Number 1 Discount broker, Free Delivery trading, Maximum Rs 20 per order for. SIA INVESTMENT, BEST STOCK Trading, Top Stock Brokers in Noida. Address: E block, Gaur City 1, sector 4, Noida, Uttar Pradesh 201309.
”
”
Krishan
“
2. Don’t trade penny stocks. A penny stock is any stock that trades under $5. Unless you are an advanced trader, you should avoid all penny stocks. I would extend this by encouraging you to also avoid all stocks priced under $10. Even if you have a small trading account ($5,000) or less, you are better off buying fewer shares of a higher-priced stock than a lot of shares of a penny stock. That is because low-priced stocks are most often associated with lower quality companies. As a result, they are not usually allowed to trade on the NYSE or the Nasdaq. Instead, they trade on the OTCBB ("over the counter bulletin board") or Pink Sheets, both of which have much less stringent financial reporting requirements than the major exchanges do. Many of these companies have never made a profit. They may be frauds or shell companies that are designed solely to enrich management and other insiders. They may also include former “blue chips” that have fallen on hard times like Eastman Kodak or Lehman Brothers. In addition, penny stocks are inherently more volatile than higher-priced stocks. Think of it this way: if a $100 stock moves $1, that is a 1% move. If a $5 stock moves $1, that is a 20% move. Many new traders underestimate the kind of emotional and financial damage that this kind of volatility can cause. In my experience, penny stocks do not trend nearly as well as higher-priced stocks. They tend to be more mean-reverting (Mean reversion occurs when a stock moves up sharply from its average trading price, only to fall right back down again to its average trading price). Many of them are eventually headed to zero, but they are still not good short candidates. Most brokers will not let you short them. And even if you do find a broker who will let you short a penny stock, how would you like to wake up to see your penny stock trading at $10 when you just shorted it at $2 a few days before? I learned that lesson the hard way. It turned out that I was risking $8 to make $2, which is not a good way to make money over the long term. To add injury to insult, a penny stock might appear to be liquid one day, and the next day, the liquidity dries up and you are confronted by a $2 bid/ask spread. Or the bid might completely disappear. Imagine owning
”
”
Matthew R. Kratter (A Beginner's Guide to the Stock Market)
“
MORE THAN SEVEN million people in the Chicago area, something like ten million road vehicles, but only one white truck had been reported stolen in the twenty-four-hour period between Sunday and Monday. It was a white Ford Econoline. Owned and operated by a South Side electrician. His insurance company made him empty the truck at night, and store his stock and tools inside his shop. Anything left inside the truck was not covered. That was the rule. It was an irksome rule, but on Monday morning when the guy came out to load up and the truck was gone, it started to look like a rule which made a whole lot of sense. He had reported the theft to the insurance broker and the police, and he was not expecting to hear much more about it. So he was duly impressed when two FBI agents turned up, forty-eight hours later, asking all kinds of urgent questions.
”
”
Lee Child (Die Trying (Jack Reacher, #2))
“
One enterprising U.S. brokerage firm, Interactive Brokers, announced that, unlike its competitors, it did not sell retail stock market orders to high-frequency traders, and even installed a button that enabled investors to route their orders directly to IEX, the stock market created by Brad Katsuyama and his team, who would protect them.
”
”
Michael Lewis (Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt)
“
Instagram is now a breeding ground for scammers on the search for unsuspecting users whom they will sell their game and flaunt their huge profits from cryptocurrency. I thought I’d struck a gold mine. I ended up messaging this broker and she went on this long spiel about Bitcoin mining and how it’s profitable, I gave it a long thought plus the strategy they used produced eye-watering returns of 50 percent per month. I was initially skeptical so a few months later I decided to invest and sent them $150 as a test, a month later I was sent back $50 along with another $30 of my profit. Shocked in disbelief I sent hundreds of dollars, then thousands, it didn't take long until I started telling friends and family who even sent more money. One of my best mates sold his car for $11,000 and put all that money in, and it disappeared. All up, my friends and I lost over $100,000 to this scam, which caused me immense stress and embarrassment plus some of my friends decided not to talk to me anymore. It was like my integrity just vanished suddenly, because I’d convinced my friends, I’d shown them my profits and I was actively promoting it, almost like a salesman for her. I tried to go to the police, who said we’d only lost $100,000. They know people who have lost millions, and this shattered every hope I had of recovering my money or tracing these criminals. I found Hackathon Tech Solution with the help of our new intern who referred me to give hackers a try, I’m really glad I listened. With the support of Hackathon Tech Solutions and my Assets recovered I was able to return to investing but only in Stocks now, I stayed away from cryptocurrencies after the scam experience. We often can’t avoid the negative patterns financially but if it’s a wrong investment at the hands of scammers Hackathon Tech Solution has you covered. Don’t hesitate to reach out to info@ hackathon tech solution . com, if you fall victim to this online Bitcoin or cryptocurrency scam.
WhatsApp is +31 6 47999256
”
”
Christabel Akari
“
Instagram is now a breeding ground for scammers on the search for unsuspecting users whom they will sell their game and flaunt their huge profits from cryptocurrency. I thought I’d struck a gold mine. I ended up messaging this broker and she went on this long spiel about Bitcoin mining and how it’s profitable, I gave it a long thought plus the strategy they used produced eye-watering returns of 50 percent per month. I was initially skeptical so a few months later I decided to invest and sent them $150 as a test, a month later I was sent back $50 along with another $30 of my profit. Shocked in disbelief I sent hundreds of dollars, then thousands, it didn't take long until I started telling friends and family who even sent more money. One of my best mates sold his car for $11,000 and put all that money in, and it disappeared. All up, my friends and I lost over $100,000 to this scam, which caused me immense stress and embarrassment plus some of my friends decided not to talk to me anymore. It was like my integrity just vanished suddenly, because I’d convinced my friends, I’d shown them my profits and I was actively promoting it, almost like a salesman for her. I tried to go to the police, who said we’d only lost $100,000. They know people who have lost millions, and this shattered every hope I had of recovering my money or tracing these criminals. I found Hackathon Tech Solution with the help of our new intern who referred me to give hackers a try, I’m really glad I listened. With the support of Hackathon Tech Solutions and my Assets recovered I was able to return to investing but only in Stocks now, I stayed away from cryptocurrencies after the scam experience. We often can’t avoid the negative patterns financially but if it’s a wrong investment at the hands of scammers Hackathon Tech Solution has you covered. Don’t hesitate to reach out to info@ hackathon tech solution . com, if you fall victim to this online Bitcoin or cryptocurrency scam.
Their WhatsApp is +31 6 47999256
”
”
Christabel Akari
“
Instagram is now a breeding ground for scammers on the search for unsuspecting users whom they will sell their game and flaunt their huge profits from cryptocurrency. I thought I’d struck a gold mine. I ended up messaging this broker and she went on this long spiel about Bitcoin mining and how it’s profitable, I gave it a long thought plus the strategy they used produced eye-watering returns of 50 percent per month. I was initially skeptical so a few months later I decided to invest and sent them $150 as a test, a month later I was sent back $50 along with another $30 of my profit. Shocked in disbelief I sent hundreds of dollars, then thousands, it didn't take long until I started telling friends and family who even sent more money. One of my best mates sold his car for $11,000 and put all that money in, and it disappeared. All up, my friends and I lost over $100,000 to this scam, which caused me immense stress and embarrassment plus some of my friends decided not to talk to me anymore. It was like my integrity just vanished suddenly, because I’d convinced my friends, I’d shown them my profits and I was actively promoting it, almost like a salesman for her. I tried to go to the police, who said we’d only lost $100,000. They know people who have lost millions, and this shattered every hope I had of recovering my money or tracing these criminals. I found Hackathon Tech Solution with the help of our new intern who referred me to give hackers a try, I’m really glad I listened. With the support of Hackathon Tech Solutions and my Assets recovered I was able to return to investing but only in Stocks now, I stayed away from cryptocurrencies after the scam experience. We often can’t avoid the negative patterns financially but if it’s a wrong investment at the hands of scammers Hackathon Tech Solution has you covered. Don’t hesitate to reach out to info@ hackathon tech solution . com, if you fall victim to this online Bitcoin or cryptocurrency scam.
Their WhatsApp is +31 6 47999256
”
”
Christabel Akari
“
Instagram is now a breeding ground for scammers on the search for unsuspecting users whom they will sell their game and flaunt their huge profits from cryptocurrency. I thought I’d struck a gold mine. I ended up messaging this broker and she went on this long spiel about Bitcoin mining and how it’s profitable, I gave it a long thought plus the strategy they used produced eye-watering returns of 50 percent per month. I was initially skeptical so a few months later I decided to invest and sent them $150 as a test, a month later I was sent back $50 along with another $30 of my profit. Shocked in disbelief I sent hundreds of dollars, then thousands, it didn't take long until I started telling friends and family who even sent more money. One of my best mates sold his car for $11,000 and put all that money in, and it disappeared. All up, my friends and I lost over $100,000 to this scam, which caused me immense stress and embarrassment plus some of my friends decided not to talk to me anymore. It was like my integrity just vanished suddenly, because I’d convinced my friends, I’d shown them my profits and I was actively promoting it, almost like a salesman for her. I tried to go to the police, who said we’d only lost $100,000. They know people who have lost millions, and this shattered every hope I had of recovering my money or tracing these criminals. I found Hackathon Tech Solution with the help of our new intern who referred me to give hackers a try, I’m really glad I listened. With the support of Hackathon Tech Solutions and my Assets recovered I was able to return to investing but only in Stocks now, I stayed away from cryptocurrencies after the scam experience. We often can’t avoid the negative patterns financially but if it’s a wrong investment at the hands of scammers Hackathon Tech Solution has you covered. Don’t hesitate to reach out to info@ hackathon tech solution . com, if you fall victim to this online Bitcoin or cryptocurrency scam.
Their website is https:// h a c k a t h o n t e c h s o l u t i o n s.com & WhatsApp is +31 6 47999256
”
”
Christabel Akari
“
The USA is the leading country for lodges, secret societies, the Ku-Klux-Klan, sects, and spiritualists. There are about 4,178,000 Free Masons in the entire world; 3.3 million of them live in the USA. All leading men of the government, from the president on down, belong to lodges, and all the lodges of course belong to and are led by the Jews. There are 49 major lodges in the USA with 16,518 branches. One cannot even count the sects and secret societies. We see that the Jew has understood how to break the USA down into individual particles and atoms, killing any kind of national life. The parties belong to him entirely, for over half of those in Congress — 213 members of the House — and more than half of the Senators, 48 in all — are Freemasons.
Gangsters and criminals along with stock brokers are other manifestations of decay brought about by Jewry. The legal system in the USA is fragmented and disunified. The benefactors are the plutocrats, corrupt politicians and businessmen without consciences. Judges are elected to their offices for a limited time. It is clear than they are dependent on the corrupt parties. Major insurance swindles, corrupting juries, and making false statements under oath are the order of the day.
”
”
Robert Ley
“
Back in those days, banks did not lend money to stock speculators. That business was left to the trust companies. Trust companies were not banks. In one way, they were the original non-bank financial institutions, the original shadow banks. They were officially financial institutions that were state chartered, and the state charter had much lighter regulatory requirements, including lower reserve requirements and the ability to write uncollateralized loans. Since banks did not write uncollateralized loans, the New York Stock Exchange brokers went to the trust companies. It was a good business for everyone. Brokers were able to get loans to leverage both their own trading positions and the positions of their clients.
”
”
Scott E.D. Skyrm (The Repo Market, Shorts, Shortages, and Squeezes)
“
Over a period of three weeks from October through November 1907, a national panic swept through the country. The trust companies were no longer able to supply loans to the stock brokers. The rate for an overnight loan used to finance stock positions shot up from 9.5% to 70%, and that was for brokers lucky enough to get a loan! There was just no money available.
”
”
Scott E.D. Skyrm (The Repo Market, Shorts, Shortages, and Squeezes)
“
Princeton Newport bought five million shares of old AT&T at about $66 a share for $330 million. We paid for most of this with term financing, which was a special loan from our broker just for this deal, to be paid off from the proceeds when the position was closed out. Meanwhile, we offset the risk of owning old AT&T by simultaneously selling short the shares we were going to receive in exchange for our shares of old AT&T. These so-called when-issued shares consisted of five million shares of new AT&T and five hundred thousand shares of each of the new seven sisters. We did the trade through Goldman Sachs by taking half of each of two successive five million share blocks of about $330 million apiece. I have a gold-colored plaque, a so-called deal toy, on my desk commemorating the December 1, 1983, block as then being the largest dollar amount for a single trade in the history of the New York Stock Exchange. In two and a half months, PNP netted $1.6 million from the AT&T trade after all costs.
”
”
Edward O. Thorp (A Man for All Markets: From Las Vegas to Wall Street, How I Beat the Dealer and the Market)
“
Before wrapping up this chapter, let us look at one of the deadly scams in the Indian primary market history. There was company named ‘MS shoes east’. Shares of this company traded in Rs 150-200 range throughout the year 1994. But towards December 1994 it spurted to Rs 500 without any justifiable rationale behind the raise. Its promoter Pavan Sachedeva and his broker artificially manipulated the stock price to this level. By February 1995, the company devised an expansion plan for an estimated expense Rs 700 crores. It proposed to raise around Rs 428 crores by means of Fully convertible bonds. These bonds were to be sold at Rs 199 each through public issue. The idea was to provoke people to subscribe the issue with a hope of converting this bond of Rs 199 to a share of Rs 500. Well, his brokers was constantly buying the stocks from the open market to maintain the price at that high level. But the situation had already worsened. He had bought too much and had too little money at hand that he could not pay the stock exchange for all the purchases he made. BSE could not give money to the sellers of that security. Things turned out to be serious. You may find it hard to believe - the BSE was shut down for three consecutive days without any business. Before this drama came to light, FCD ('Fully Convertible Debenture) public issue was a big success and it almost stole the show. Delighted by the overwhelming response from the investing community, MS Shoes had announced to close the public issues few days before the stipulated time. The world came to know that the cruel plan of manipulating the stock price was only to push the bond issue successfully. Even the authorities woke up to the problem. The company was issued a notice. And also it allowed the investors to take back their FCD application. Almost all the investors took back. Even the underwriter refused to buy the unsold portion of the issue because the company had voluntarily announced to close the issue before the end date. The ruling was in favor the underwriter. Sachedeva declared himself to be innocent. MS shoes office resembled a mourning house with deserted look. There was one Sachedeva who came to light. There were and probably still are more of them out there.
”
”
Chellamuthu Kuppusamy (The Science of Stock Market Investment - Practical Guide to Intelligent Investors)
“
If you entirely construct your decisions based on broker’s words, you might sometimes gain and sometimes loose. Notwithstanding that what you fail to notice is that your broker would always make money.
”
”
Chellamuthu Kuppusamy (The Science of Stock Market Investment - Practical Guide to Intelligent Investors)
“
Brokers could spread their geographical presence through the length and breadth of nation and subsequently reach out customers who otherwise would never have gotten the chance to venture into stock investment. Auction, bidding, negotiation and what not, everything takes place at computer terminals. In the old system of outcry auction calling out the price on the trading floor, everyone would know which broker actually trades. But in the new system anonymity is maintained. You can play with millions of shares with cup of tea in one hand and puff of cigarette on the other. There
”
”
Chellamuthu Kuppusamy (The Science of Stock Market Investment - Practical Guide to Intelligent Investors)
“
The phase where you need to get in early at the game is the body. This is where volumes begin to rise and the pace of rise also starts to accelerate. You also start to see influential brokers and investors talking about the stock. If you can anticipate that this is the big opportunity before the crowd gets in, you get to ride the full climb. Even
”
”
Ashu Dutt (15 Easy Steps to Mastering Technical Charts)
“
Diversification is a way to protect financial consultants and stock brokers from ever looking really bad, but it also stops them from looking really good as well. What happens with broad diversification—holding a portfolio of, say, fifty or more different stocks—is that the winners will be canceled out by the losers, just as the losers will be canceled out by the winners. Diversification creates a situation that basically mimics the market or an index fund. An adviser who counsels diversification never looks very good or very bad, just average.
”
”
David Clark (Tao of Charlie Munger: A Compilation of Quotes from Berkshire Hathaway's Vice Chairman on Life, Business, and the Pursuit of Wealth With Commentary by David Clark)
“
One of the more useful things I learned as a midshipman at Maine Maritime Academy were the names of the seven masts of a seven masted schooner. When I mentioned to the 600 people in attendance at a Homecoming event that my degree was a BS in Marlinspike Seamanship no one laughed, leaving me in the embarrassing position of having to explain that actually I had a Bachelor of Marine Science degree. Later looking into a mirror I convinced myself that I really didn’t look old enough to have lived in an era when wooden ships were sailed by iron men. What I remembered was that we were wooden men sailing on iron ships that were actually made of steel, however I can remember schooners sailing along the coast of New England and I do remember the seven names of a seven masted schooner.
In actual fact only one seven masted schooner was ever built and she was the she a 475 foot, steel hulled wind driven collier/tanker named the Thomas W. Lawson, named after a Boston millionaire, stock-broker, book author, and President of the Boston Bay State Gas Co. Launched in 1902 she held the distinction of being the largest pure sail ship ever built. Originally the names of the masts were the foremast, mainmast, mizzenmast, spanker, jigger, driver, and pusher. Later the spanker became the kicker and the spanker moved to next to last place, with the pusher becoming the after mast. Depending on whom you talked to, the names and their order drifted around and a lot of different naming systems were formed. Some systems used numbers and others the days of the week, however there are very few, if any of the iron men left to dispute what the masts were called.
The Thomas W. Lawson had two steam winches and smaller electrically driven winches, to raise and lower her huge sails. The electricity was provided by a generator, driven by what was termed a donkey engine. On November 20, 1907 the large 475 foot schooner sailed for England. Experiencing stormy weather she passed inside of the Bishop Rock lighthouse and attempted to anchor. That night both anchor chains broke, causing the ship to smash against Shag Rock near Annet. The schooner, pounded by heavy seas capsized and sank. Of the 19 souls aboard Captain George W. Dow and the ships engineer Edward L. Rowe were the only survivors. Everyone else, including the pilot, drown and were buried in a mass grave in St Agnes cemetery.
”
”
Hank Bracker
“
Whether intuition generates delusion or insight depends on whether you work in a world full of valid cues you can unconsciously register for future use. “For example, it is very likely that there are early indications that a building is about to collapse in a fire or that an infant will soon show obvious symptoms of infection,” Kahneman and Klein wrote. “On the other hand, it is unlikely that there is publicly available information that could be used to predict how well a particular stock will do—if such valid information existed, the price of the stock would already reflect it. Thus, we have more reason to trust the intuition of an experienced fireground commander about the stability of a building, or the intuitions of a nurse about an infant, than to trust the intuitions of a stock broker.
”
”
Philip E. Tetlock (Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction)
“
demand imbalances. He believed that stories about speculators’ raids were essentially ghost stories that brokers told clients to keep them in the dark
”
”
Edwin Lefèvre (Reminiscences of a Stock Operator: With New Commentary and Insights on the Life and Times of Jesse Livermore)
“
If you can’t figure out what category your stocks are in, then ask your broker. If a broker recommended the stocks in the first place, then you definitely ought to ask, because how else are you to know what you’re looking for? Are you looking for slow growth, fast growth, recession protection, a turnaround, a cyclical bounce, or assets?
”
”
Peter Lynch (One Up on Wall Street: How To Use What You Already Know To Make Money in the Market)
“
The stock market crash finds a continuation in the takeover frenzy. It is no longer stocks and shares being bought, but companies being bought up. A virtual effervescence is created, with a potential impact on economic restructuring which, in spite of what is said, is purely speculative. The hope is that this enforced circulation will produce a broker's commission — exactly as on the Stock Exchange . Not even an objective profit exactly: the profit from speculation is not exactly surplus value, and what is at stake here is certainly not what is at stake in classical capitalism.
Speculation, like poker or roulette, has its own runaway logic, a chainreaction logic, a process of intensification [Steigerung], in which the thrill of the game and of bidding up the stakes plays a considerable role. This is why there is no point criticizing it on the basis of economic logic (this is what makes these phenomena so exciting: the economic being overtaken by a random, vertiginous form).
The game is such as to become suicidal: big companies end up buying back their own shares, which is nonsensical from the economic point of view: they end up mounting takeover bids for themselves! But this is all part of the same madness. In the case of takeovers, companies are not traded - do not circulate - as real capital, as units of production; they are traded as a quantity of shares, as a mere probability of production , which is enough to create a virtual movement within the economy.
That this will be a prelude to other crashes is highly probable, for the same reasons as apply in the case of stocks and shares: things are circulating too quickly. We might imagine labour itself - labour power — moving into this speculative orbit too. The worker would no longer sell his labour power for a wage, as in the classic capitalist process, but sell his job itself, his employment. And he would buy others and sell them on again, as their stock went up or down on the Labour Exchange (the term would then assume its full meaning). It would not be so much a question of doing the jobs as keeping them circulating, creating a virtual movement of employment which substituted for the real movement of labour.
”
”
Jean Baudrillard (Screened Out)
“
Right tools and services: High-speed Internet service. The best available broker. A fast order execution platform that supports Hotkeys. A scanner for finding the right stocks to trade. Support from a community of traders.
”
”
AMS Publishing Group (Intelligent Stock Market Trading and Investment: Quick and Easy Guide to Stock Market Investment for Absolute Beginners)
“
My family’s medicine cabinet was never stocked with Tylenol or Dayquil like in other homes. Instead, jars of turmeric, dried basil leaves, black pepper balls, ginger powder, kasturi pills, and other kitchen ingredients lined the shelves of our bathroom.
”
”
Snigdha Nandipati (A Case of Culture: How Cultural Brokers Bridge Divides in Healthcare)
“
Before hiring a broker, ask him about his commission schedule. You may be able to find this type of information by email or online—you need this information in order to know how much you will be charged per trade. You should also find out if there are bonus fees for shares that are trading at a low price. If
”
”
James Frostad (Penny Stocks: How to Buy and Trade Penny Stocks for Massive Profits)
“
A beautiful example of a long-term intention was presented by A. T. Ariyaratane, a Buddhist elder, who is considered to be the Gandhi of Sri Lanka. For seventeen years there had been a terrible civil war in Sri Lanka. At one point, the Norwegians were able to broker peace, and once the peace treaty was in effect, Ariyaratane called the followers of his Sarvodaya movement together. Sarvodaya combines Buddhist principles of right livelihood, right action, right understanding, and compassion and has organized citizens in one-third of that nation’s villages to dig wells, build schools, meditate, and collaborate as a form of spiritual practice. Over 650,000 people came to the gathering to hear how he envisioned the future of Sri Lanka. At this gathering he proposed a five-hundred-year peace plan, saying, “The Buddha teaches we must understand causes and conditions. It’s taken us five hundred years to create the suffering that we are in now.” Ari described the effects of four hundred years of colonialism, of five hundred years of struggle between Hindus, Muslims, and Buddhists, and of several centuries of economic disparity. He went on, “It will take us five hundred years to change these conditions.” Ariyaratane then offered solutions, proposing a plan to heal the country. The plan begins with five years of cease-fire and ten years of rebuilding roads and schools. Then it goes on for twenty-five years of programs to learn one another’s languages and cultures, and fifty years of work to right economic injustice, and to bring the islanders back together as a whole. And every hundred years there will be a grand council of elders to take stock on how the plan is going. This is a sacred intention, the long-term vision of an elder.
”
”
Jack Kornfield (Bringing Home the Dharma: Awakening Right Where You Are)
“
Growth-Stock Approach Every investor would like to select the stocks of companies that will do better than the average over a period of years. A growth stock may be defined as one that has done this in the past and is expected to do so in the future.2 Thus it seems only logical that the intelligent investor should concentrate upon the selection of growth stocks. Actually the matter is more complicated, as we shall try to show. It is a mere statistical chore to identify companies that have “out-performed the averages” in the past. The investor can obtain a list of 50 or 100 such enterprises from his broker.† Why, then, should he not merely pick out the 15 or 20 most likely looking issues of this group and lo! he has a guaranteed-successful stock portfolio? There are two catches to this simple idea. The first is that common stocks with good records and apparently good prospects sell at correspondingly high prices. The investor may be right in his judgment of their prospects and still not fare particularly well, merely because he has paid in full (and perhaps overpaid) for the expected prosperity. The second is that his judgment as to the future may prove wrong. Unusually rapid growth cannot keep up forever; when a company has already registered a brilliant expansion, its very increase in size makes a repetition of its achievement more difficult. At some point the growth curve flattens out, and in many cases it turns downward.
”
”
Benjamin Graham (The Intelligent Investor)
“
Whilst writing this chapter I examined the accounts of a large UK CFD and spread betting provider. They made an average of $1,379 in revenue per customer. Revenue for a brokerage company is a cost for their customers. The customers had an average of $500 on deposit with the brokers at the end of the year. Running a brokerage firm is clearly more lucrative than being a client. According to an old story, a naive client visiting New York and admiring the boats of bankers and brokers asked: “Where are the customers’ yachts?” Every time you trade you remove some money from your account and hand it to your broker. Limit your trading to the absolute minimum. Do not assume you will make sufficient profits to cover costs which are inflated by overtrading. Those
”
”
Robert Carver (Leveraged Trading: A professional approach to trading FX, stocks on margin, CFDs, spread bets and futures for all traders)
“
A margin call is a demand for additional collateral from a customer who has borrowed money from his broker to buy stocks and whose stocks are now worth barely enough to cover the loan.
”
”
John Brooks (Business Adventures: Twelve Classic Tales from the World of Wall Street)
“
A newcomer visiting a stock exchange and witnessing trading going on would most likely think that a fight had erupted amongst the traders. There would be screaming and shouting, pulling and pushing, and communication between brokers taking place with the help of sign language.
”
”
Anil Lamba (Flirting with Stocks: Stock Market Investing for Beginners)