Jack Litle on When to Place Big Bets and Global Macro Trading
Jack Litle is the founder of MercenaryTrader.com. He’s also a global macro trader.
He started as an international commodity broker and now has more than 17 years of market experience . He’s a very competitive trader and avid poker player, and see the many crossovers between them. .
Jack talks about his opinion on trading in terms of probabilistic outcomes. He believes this is better instead of trying to predict the future. He also shares insight into the times when traders need to press hard on a trade in order to make a real impact on profits.
What’s Covered in This Interview:
- Jack;s into his global macro perspective, including how he analyses markets using a top-down/bottom-up approach and what economic factors he takes into consideration
- What Jack decides on before finally entering a position.
- Jack provides an example of a recent macro ‘theme’ in energy stocks.
- How traders can spend their time better, instead of wasting it on things that don’t impact your PnL.
- The difference between serious competitors and average traders.
- How to master the art on making a big get, including four things you need to take into consideration.
- Why poker is great training for trading and the benefits of studying how the professionals earn money.
- Why trading is a game of probabilities and expectations, and why many traders are obsessed with hunting for certainty.
- How to shift your mindset to probabilistic outcomes instead of predicting them.
Links and Resources:
- The Investment Biker – A book by Jim Rogers that talks about how he as an ex hedge fund manager took motorbike trip around the world in order to decide which countries he wanted to invest in.
- Stock Market Wizards – A book by Jack Schwager which features interviews with some of the worlds greatest stock traders. This was one of the books Jack used during his early days.
- The Black Swan A book by Nassim Taleb Jack recommends to learn more about the philosophy of probability and statistics.
- Trading Risk – A book by Kenneth Grant, a risk manager for top hedge funds. This book covers the persistence of profit distributions using the 90:10 pattern.
- On Form and Technique (in Poker and Trading) – One of Jack’s articles which dives into the topic of average traders versus more serious competitors.
- How Experienced Traders Die (Going Out Like Broomcorn’s Uncle) – Another one of Jack’s articles which focuses on topics like wasted time.
- MercenaryTrader.com – Visit Jack’s website to learn about his ‘community of ruthless profiteers’.
- @MercenaryJack – Follow Jack on Twitter.
