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Thread: Why the rule that the dealer stands on a hard 17?

  1. #40


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    Quote Originally Posted by Dbs6582 View Post
    Don, yes I am aware of this. I am very aware that Ed Thorp is worth a lot, and he made most his money running hedge funds on Wall Street. And yes, I understanding leveraged trading contributed to Thorp’s success. What I’m calling into question is a different point. Did all this have anything to do with bj or his experience in casinos? Many people made/make this type of money on Wall Street and they didn’t play bj or know the math behind bj. I think it’s kind of silly to attribute Thorp’s success on Wall Street to bj.

    All math in the stock market is based on using the past to predict the future. Most of the time this works since our markets are some of the most stable in the world. But when an unforeseen even happens, this math breaks down. Are you aware of what happened at Lehman Brothers? Their complicated math models broke down due to an unpredictable event, the housing bubble and crash.

    Since what Ed Thorp did occurred over the short run, he succeeded. This happens with gamblers too. We don’t know what would have happened with Throp’s strategy in the long run. I expect the same thing that happened to Lehman’s Brothers, since no one can predict the future no matter how good their math is. What we’re in essence talking about is using math to predict the future in stocks, since the data that will be used is alway from the past. One of the first things most investors learn is that “the past does not predict the future”.

    I just found a quote from Ed Thorp on what happened to him in 2008. He said: “At 2008, I didn’t have any place to hide”. He lost a significant amount during this time and he said he still hasn’t fully recovered from that. It appears his great math model failed him during this time.

    Don't worry Don, many of my big time Wall Street friend don’t understand this either. They also disagreed with me, but they were more polite in their disagreement. When someone has had success doing something in the short run, they start thinking the’ve figured it out. The good news for our Wall Street buddies is when they mess up (which inevitably happens) we know our government will bail them out. That’s what happened during that last financial crises 10 years ago. If it wasn’t for our government bailing them out, many big banks and financial institutions would have gone under, doing pretty much what Ed Thorp was doing. So the big guys win, and us little tax payers lose, even when the big guys are wrong. I don’t agree with that, but that’s part of our system.

    Btw, did you know one of Ed Thorp’s hedge funds was shut down due to being embroiled in the junk bond schemes from Michael Milken? Just because someone made a lot of money doesn’t mean they made it an ethical way. A person’s net worth does not indicate his intelligence. Think about that for a while.

    One last comment. Did you know Ed Thorp has paid to have his body cryogenic frozen when he dies so he can be brought back to life in the future when our technology is further ahead. I’m not making this up. Look it up. Ed Thorp has actually given the odds that he will be brought back to life at 2%. Do you think this is smart too? You may since Ed Thorp is worth $800 million. That appears to be your measuring stick for how you determine if someone is smart. If they are wealthy, then you believe they must be smart. Btw, I give the odds of Ed Thorp being brought back to life at 0%.
    I'm going to be very polite this time. I have been a friend of Ed Thorp for well over 30 years. There is NOTHING in his background that you can teach me about him. Princeton-Newport and Oakley-Sutton were clients of Morgan Stanley, and we dealt with them on a daily basis. His partner in NJ, Jay Regan, was the wrongdoer; Thorp had no knowledge of what was going on.

    As for his hedge fund results being short term, you obviously have no knowledge of how long he ran/has been running the fund. It isn't what any rational person would call "short-term."

    Finally, Ed Thorp is one of the all-time great minds of the 20th/21st centuries. He figured out some of the most important principles of both blackjack and the financial markets long before anyone else did -- a true visionary.

    You may write back anything you wish, but I won't be responding any further. Given the below, please don't try to dazzle me with your knowledge of these subjects.

    Don

    Donald Schlesinger is the President of Demand Derivatives Corp.Prior to the merging of the individual product companies under the DDC corporate umbrella, he was instrumental in directing the companies separately.
    Donald Schlesinger was the Vice Chairman and Chief Strategy Officer of The VolX Group Corporation and RealDay Options Corporation — after a period of semi-retirement. Before this he was an Executive Director in Morgan Stanley Dean Witter’s Worldwide Equity Derivatives department. As the Director of Derivatives Education and Training, some of Don’s responsibilities included the creation, supervision, and delivery of in-house programs, as well as educational seminars for clients. In 1993, Don helped establish and perfect risk-management techniques and systems for global equity derivatives traders at the firm. Schlesinger was a member of the Institutional Equity Division’s derivatives risk-management committee and served as a liaison between that unit and the firm’s head of global risk management.
    Prior to assuming these roles, he was a Proprietary Trader and Options Strategist at Morgan Stanley, from 1984 to 1994, where he managed the firm’s domestic over-the-counter options book and priced structured products for clients. Schlesinger has lectured extensively on options theory and hedging techniques, having participated in many industry-sponsored events, and has written numerous published papers and articles on options strategies. Among them are: “Options Alphabet Soup,” “Looking Askew at Volatility,” “Hedging First- and Second-Order Sensitivities of Options” (“Learning Curve” article in Derivatives Week), “Volatility Cones Come in Many Flavors” (co-authored with Robert Krause, for Futures Magazine), “Hedging Imperfect Baskets” (co-authored with Robert Krause, for Derivatives Strategy magazine), and “Volatility Trading: RealVol futures Jump into the Mix” (co-authored with Robert Krause, for Swiss Derivatives Review).
    In 1996, Don was part of the third-place “All-America Research Team,” named by Institutional Investor, which commented: “The group’s ‘top notch’ educational seminars, under the direction of Donald Schlesinger, demystify derivatives, according to a participant.” In 1991–92, Schlesinger was the featured speaker in over 100 presentations of Morgan Stanley’s PERCS product to institutional clients in the U.S. and Europe.
    Since leaving the firm, Don has continued to lecture at Morgan Stanley, and has also done training and presentations for Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse First Boston, the Options Industry Council, and Electronic Trading Group.
    As a former teacher in the New York City school system, Schlesinger taught high school-level mathematics and French for 16 years. He holds Master of Philosophy and M.A. degrees in French from the City University of New York, and a B.S. in mathematics, cum laude, from The City College of New York.

  2. #41


    1 out of 1 members found this post helpful. Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by therefinery View Post
    Dbs: You're so ignorant on these matters I can only conclude you're a troll, and one with too much time on their hands. I guess you only know of Don from his contributions to blackjack. Why you think you can educate him on trading is mind blowing.
    He is most obviously a troll.

    The real question is WHY does ANYONE respond to him? You know he loves the attention, and would go away if he didn't get it here. You would think a group of disciplined APs would have enough discipline to ignore him.

    OF COURSE he'll respond to this, but watch this....I won't. Then he'll wait a few hours, maybe even a day, and return with a "reread my entire post". And guess what? I won't respond to that. But someone will, and he'll continue getting his jollies at the expense of this forum.

  3. #42

  4. #43


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    Quote Originally Posted by RCJH View Post
    OF COURSE he'll respond to this, but watch this....I won't. Then he'll wait a few hours, maybe even a day, and return with a "reread my entire post". And guess what? I won't respond to that. But someone will, and he'll continue getting his jollies at the expense of this forum.
    That last sentence above sums up the man perfectly. I strongly believe that he thinks he scored a home run today in some sort of perverted way.

  5. #44


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    Quote Originally Posted by BoSox View Post
    That last sentence above sums up the man perfectly. I strongly believe that he thinks he scored a home run today in some sort of perverted way.
    I thought Don did an excellent job of crapping on the Dipshit. He was concise and to the point.

  6. #45


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    Quote Originally Posted by Freightman View Post
    I thought Don did an excellent job of crapping on the Dipshit. He was concise and to the point.
    Don't you see? Dbs, enjoys getting people all aggravated and gets off on the spanking.
    Last edited by BoSox; 01-14-2019 at 02:21 PM.

  7. #46


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    That's why you need to ignore him

  8. #47


    0 out of 4 members found this post helpful. Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by DSchles View Post
    I'm going to be very polite this time. I have been a friend of Ed Thorp for well over 30 years. There is NOTHING in his background that you can teach me about him. Princeton-Newport and Oakley-Sutton were clients of Morgan Stanley, and we dealt with them on a daily basis. His partner in NJ, Jay Regan, was the wrongdoer; Thorp had no knowledge of what was going on.

    As for his hedge fund results being short term, you obviously have no knowledge of how long he ran/has been running the fund. It isn't what any rational person would call "short-term."

    Finally, Ed Thorp is one of the all-time great minds of the 20th/21st centuries. He figured out some of the most important principles of both blackjack and the financial markets long before anyone else did -- a true visionary.

    You may write back anything you wish, but I won't be responding any further. Given the below, please don't try to dazzle me with your knowledge of these subjects.

    Don

    Donald Schlesinger is the President of Demand Derivatives Corp.Prior to the merging of the individual product companies under the DDC corporate umbrella, he was instrumental in directing the companies separately.
    Donald Schlesinger was the Vice Chairman and Chief Strategy Officer of The VolX Group Corporation and RealDay Options Corporation — after a period of semi-retirement. Before this he was an Executive Director in Morgan Stanley Dean Witter’s Worldwide Equity Derivatives department. As the Director of Derivatives Education and Training, some of Don’s responsibilities included the creation, supervision, and delivery of in-house programs, as well as educational seminars for clients. In 1993, Don helped establish and perfect risk-management techniques and systems for global equity derivatives traders at the firm. Schlesinger was a member of the Institutional Equity Division’s derivatives risk-management committee and served as a liaison between that unit and the firm’s head of global risk management.
    Prior to assuming these roles, he was a Proprietary Trader and Options Strategist at Morgan Stanley, from 1984 to 1994, where he managed the firm’s domestic over-the-counter options book and priced structured products for clients. Schlesinger has lectured extensively on options theory and hedging techniques, having participated in many industry-sponsored events, and has written numerous published papers and articles on options strategies. Among them are: “Options Alphabet Soup,” “Looking Askew at Volatility,” “Hedging First- and Second-Order Sensitivities of Options” (“Learning Curve” article in Derivatives Week), “Volatility Cones Come in Many Flavors” (co-authored with Robert Krause, for Futures Magazine), “Hedging Imperfect Baskets” (co-authored with Robert Krause, for Derivatives Strategy magazine), and “Volatility Trading: RealVol futures Jump into the Mix” (co-authored with Robert Krause, for Swiss Derivatives Review).
    In 1996, Don was part of the third-place “All-America Research Team,” named by Institutional Investor, which commented: “The group’s ‘top notch’ educational seminars, under the direction of Donald Schlesinger, demystify derivatives, according to a participant.” In 1991–92, Schlesinger was the featured speaker in over 100 presentations of Morgan Stanley’s PERCS product to institutional clients in the U.S. and Europe.
    Since leaving the firm, Don has continued to lecture at Morgan Stanley, and has also done training and presentations for Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse First Boston, the Options Industry Council, and Electronic Trading Group.
    As a former teacher in the New York City school system, Schlesinger taught high school-level mathematics and French for 16 years. He holds Master of Philosophy and M.A. degrees in French from the City University of New York, and a B.S. in mathematics, cum laude, from The City College of New York.
    Don, thank you for your thoughtful reply. Your explantion of what happened at Princeton-Newport helps. When I looked into it, it was not clear what happened. Most articles just say it was emboiled with Milken junk bond stuff, and was shut down.

    I have not tried to dazzel anybody with my brilliance. I got involved with this thread when Freightman made the stupid comment that casinos are like the stock market. This is one of my pet peeves so I responded. One adds tangiable value to our country, the other does not (other than entertainment). One was illegal in our county until 1931, the other one is what built our country to be the great country it is. One is a zero sum game, the other is not. This is not saying anything brilliant. This is just stating facts.

    I understand Mr. Thorp is your friend and I respect that you want to defend him. I fully understand you and Mr. Thorp have a background far beyond mine when it comes to math and options. I understand options and have used them, but I don’t have an in dept knowledge of them like you and Mr. Thorp. I have not said I know more about options than you or Ed Thorp, other than to say two people can be opposite sides of an option trade and they can both be winners in the broader sense of the market.

    When I responded to Bosox where he was trying to troll me (he made a comment I should try to teach you and Thorp about options), I responded with sarcasm saying yes, I would be glad to help out you guys out. I don’t know if you’ve noticed but people on this site are constantly trolling me since I defend casinos. I’m probably the biggest defender of casinos on this site. I’ve never understood why anybody thinks casinos are evil or doing something wrong when they’re doing exactly what their business model asks them to do (providing negative EV games for the purpose of entertainment). Yes, I get why casinos don’t want APs in their place who play these games in a positive EV ways. If everybody did this, casinos wouldn’t be in businesss for long, and our government would not be collecting any taxes from them, which is why governments have legalized casinos in the first place. I always tell people to think of casinos (and lotteries) as our government’s voluntary tax program.


    Back to Ed Thorp. I just bought his book “A Man for All Markets” and I’m looking forward to reading it. I enjoy reading books on investing. This does not mean I’ll agree with everything in it. This is also how I am when I read articles. I don’t agree with everything I read. I must admit, it hit me wrong when I read articles on Ed Thorp and he said bj and casinos helped him with investing (I’m paraphrasing here). I’ve played AP bj for 20 years (I read Beat the Dealer 20 years ago), but I see nothing in it that has helped me with investing. That’s me. Yes, I alway bet more when I have an advantage but this is because I know when I have an advantage through the math. There is no math that will tell me how to buy low and sell high in stocks. If there was, everybody would use it. I’m talking about the broader stock market and not about options. That’s been my main disagreement with Ed Thorp, so far. Isn’t this what makes our country great? Free speech. I’m not attacking Ed Thorp or saying he’s stupid just because I disagree with this one comment.

    Since my last post, I have spent quite a bit of time listening to Ed Thorp interviews on YouTube. I’ve found these fascinating and learned a lot. One of the more interesting tidbits is that Mr. Thorp knew Bennie Madoff’s hedge fund was “fake” (Thorp’s words). In 1991, 17 years before Madoff’s hedge fund was exposed, Mr. Thorp had looked at some of the trades and seen many were fake trades and could not have occurred. He also noticed Madoff’s consistently made 20% returns, which he knew wasn’t possible. He therefore advised several people to get out of Madoff’s fund and into his. Thorp said he wasn’t surprised when Madoff’s fund was finally exposed as being a ponzie scheme in 2008.

    When I heard Mr. Thorp say all this, I wondered why he didn’t call the securities exchange back in 1991 and report Madoff? I was surprised the interviewer didn’t ask him that question. I’ve read a lot about the Bennie Madoff scandal, but this is the first time I heard Ed Thorp knew it was a fake hedge fund 17 years before it was exposed. As you know, Madoff’s ponzie scheme hurt a lot of people.

    Good discussion. I feel honored you’ve taken the time to respond to my posts. I’m sorry if you took my posts as trying to dazzel people with my brilliance. That was not my intent. I think my sacrasim probably comes off a little wrong on my posts. Part of my sacrasim comes from all the names I’ve been called on this site and in response to people trolling me. I’ve enjoyed this forum and learned a lot from it. I’m glad Norm allows for an open sharing of ideas on his forum; even though it doesn’t always relate to advantage play.
    Last edited by Dbs6582; 01-15-2019 at 06:33 AM.

  9. #48


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    Just one more thing. Read this carefully to understand what Thorp did: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistical_arbitrage

    It has nothing to do with "investing." The PDT group at Morgan Stanley, mentioned in the article, was managed by Peter Muller, a very good friend of mine, whose office was right next to mine. And pairs trading was started at the firm by Nunzio Tartaglia, whose assistant was the Gerry Bamberger whom you will read about in Thorp's book (starting on page 237). I knew all of these people very well, as they were all my colleagues at MS.

    When you do thousands upon thousands of trades a day, whose average life span is a couple of seconds (!), that isn't "investing in the stock market." So, when you say that you don't understand why Thorp likened stat arb to what he did in blackjack, you demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of the endeavor.

    Don
    Last edited by DSchles; 01-15-2019 at 10:34 AM.

  10. #49


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    Don, Demand Derivatives Corp. sounds very impressive from looking it up on the internet, which will launch sometime this year. Congratulations are in order and best wishes to both you and Norm.

    Team Officers:

    Robert Krause CEO

    Donald Schlesinger President

    Norman Wattenberger Technology Head

    Are the Real Vol - A suite of realized volatility indices and instruments, and the Real Globe - listed Country equity indices types of Fund investments? Or is all your products going to be directed only for traders?
    Last edited by BoSox; 01-15-2019 at 02:31 PM.

  11. #50


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    Quote Originally Posted by BoSox View Post
    Don, Demand Derivatives Corp. sounds very impressive from looking it up on the internet, which will launch sometime this year. Congratulations are in order and best wishes to both you and Norm.

    Team Officers:

    Robert Krause CEO

    Donald Schlesinger President

    Norman Wattenberger Technology Head

    Are the Real Vol - A suite of realized volatility indices and instruments, and the Real Globe - listed Country equity indices types of Fund investments? Or is all your products going to be directed toward only for traders?
    Norm
    Does thus mean you do not spend all of your income producing time with QFit software?

  12. #51


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    Quote Originally Posted by Freightman View Post
    Norm
    Does thus mean you do not spend all of your income producing time with QFit software?
    Norm is moving on up to the East Side.

    https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q...A&&FORM=VRDGAR

  13. #52


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    He's already on the east side.

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