Flash Boys
Michael Lewis
Summary
How Wall Street and the stock market is rigged by high frequency trading firms
Rating: 4/5
Notes
Citadel is the largest HFT in the world at the time of writing
Citadel is taking a shit ton of order flow
Wall Street is a whole industry of bullshit
Goldman and Credit Suisse have the largest dark pools
Customers orders trade inside dark pools against banks who trade against them
Most SEC members go work for HFT firms after the SEC
HFT firms want everything kept in the dark
Since Reg NMS in 2005, more HFTs were incentivized and exploded in value
HFTs pay banks for access to customer’s orders inside their own dark pools
Payment for order flow was pioneered by Bernie Madoff
More exchanges = more HFTs = more chances of front running
HFTs fueled by Reg NMS - needs to be redone
Electronic front-running, rebate arbitrage and slow market arbitrage
Look up Reg NMS
Customers orders are monetized by the wall street banks for the wall street banks. They trade against it or sell it to HFTs for profit
Banks fail to send orders to the marketplace because they want to use their own dark pool
***
Free E-book download here
Make Something Wonderful
Steve Jobs
Summary
The life of Steve Jobs in his own words
Rating: 5/5
Notes
Make something wonderful and put it out there
‘You appear, have a chance to blaze in the sky, then you disappear’
When you’re a stranger in a place, you notice thing you don’t otherwise (Jobs after India trip)
Whenever you start with nothing, always shoot for the moon. You have nothing to lose.
You never achieve what you want without falling on your face a few times
Never be afraid to fail. You never achieve what you want without falling flat on your face a few times
We are never taught to listen to our intuitions, to develop and nurture them. But if you do pay attention to these subtle insights, you can make them come true
Creativity equals connecting previously unrelated experiences and insights others don’t see
Believe that some of what you follow with your heart will come back and make your life richer. And it will. And you will gain even firmer trust on your instincts and intuitions
Make your avocation your vocation. Make what you love your work.
The journey is the reward. The reward isn’t in the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, it’s in crossing the rainbow
To find A+ talent, if experienced, look at their track record and results
The world we know is a human creation and we can push it forward
The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do (read whole ad ‘here’s to the crazy ones)
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then is not an act but a habit - Aristotle
Hire people better than you are
You can’t plan to meet the people who will change your life
It’s impossible to connect the dots looking forward, but they make sense looking backwards so you have to trust the dots will somehow connect in your future
Everything around you that you call life was made up by people no smarter than you
***
Buy the book here
Free E-book download here