Are these Vendors , traders ?

recently some vendors were mentioned in a few scattered posts that I'm too lazy to go search for. I'm wondering if anyone has any proof or has been shown statements that these folks actually trade. I'm not questioning their ability as teachers/ educators. I just simply want to know if they actually trade.

Bryce Gilmore , Larry Pesavento and Joe Ross......I believe Jim Kane mentioned them......any info on them as traders?

Mike Reed and Trade stalker - bakrob from Canada mentioned them.....I have emailed them twice and exchanged "words" with Mikes partner Julie...lots of fluff but never a statement.....

Buzzy Shwartz....Charter Joe mentioned him...the pitbull...I believe Schwagger got statements before he did Market Wizards.....same would be true for Lynda Raschke..I think it's interesting that Buzzy didn't really follow the vendor path yet he seems to be most credible due to his low profile....

Let me repeat: I'm not commenting on the effectiveness of the training or the ideas....


I personally paid over 3 grand to a Kent Calhoun in 1996 without seeing statements...he had great ideas...but was an ego- maniac....I'd be more selective if I had to do it over....I drove the guy crazy with all my questions until I got my 3 grand worth......

Tons others don't give any proof but I'm just interested in these most recent folks....thanks

Bruce

[Admin edit: corrected spelling]

Buzzy, to the best of my knowledge still holds the world record from the traders challenge for longest running finalist and for making the most money. The traders cup lasted one quarter and ran for 7 years, his avg quarter return was an astounding 210%, these were real trades with trade confermations posted to the public. He also ran hedge fund Sabina Partners, where he had more than 25million under management. But due to some health problems dissolved the fund almost a year later. Last I heard he lived in FL, I have tried to contact him a couple of times but to no avail.

Thanks Joe, I wonder if it is an unspoken rule among vendors to NOT show statements......it always seemed to me that any legit service provider would be glad to provide statements....imagine having brain surgery from a Doctor who taught surgery at a college but never actually performed it themselves......or a contractor who read books on building a house but never built one.........

Hey, Bruce. I sure don't want to start up a &%#@storm over here with my comments, as I have my hands full elsewhere, but this is a topic I have wanted to write up a reference article for on my website for some time now. I already kind of know the typical response to what I am going to say, but I'll say it anyway. I sure wouldn't want have a doctor operate on me that never performed surgery before, I agree to that. But I am sure that a good percentage of that doctor's training (not the final practice with a surgeon and shadowing him/her) was from people that never practiced surgery. But that's not a great example. Look at top tennis coaches, golf coaches, some basketball and football coaches, and so on. Many have never played the games in their lives. Their skill is in understanding the game and in understanding how to help players improve.

What if a person was, for example, born handicapped, or became handicapped, and couldn't swim. Maybe they have never swam in their life. What if they had a deathly fear of the water. But let's say it turns out they have a gift for helping someone improve their swimming, and went on to assist many of the top swimmers in the world. Should they be denied by everyone respect for what they can do, help people improve their swimming, just because they can't swim themselves? I mention this example because I heard about such a swim coach who couldn't swim.

This type of discussion almost always leads to comments like "Well, that's a coach, and I'm talking about a mentor or a teacher." To me that's all semantics. I would choose for someone to assist my learning someone who I thought could assist me the most. Many great performers are horrible teachers, and many teachers are horrible performers. Very few are both, and if we all wanted to wait for one who is both, we'd mostly still be waiting on the list when we die.

If the person understands the skill to be taught who cares if they perform it. I don't. How many gymnastics coaches were gymnasts themselves? Olympic ice skating coaches, and so on. This may sound funny coming from me, but I have to disagree with the viewpoint that proving one can perform is the most important thing to look for in a 'trainer'. I think this has come out of the fact that perhaps 99.99% of trainers in this particular field are charlatans, and can neither trade nor teach. Hey, we listen to many top psychology mentors in this business, and some are neither psychologists nor traders (despite the fact that you are sure they all are both), but we respect the heck out of them.

Don't get me wrong, I'd prefer working with someone who has a proven track record and is great at teaching and explaining, but there aren't enough of them to go around. If I had to choose between someone who never traded one contract in their lives but had an uncanny knack for understanding trading and all the nuances, and helped five of my friends substantially by working with them, or a great trader with a fistful of statements who wasn't very good at explaining things, and none of my friends really benefitted much from working with him, I'd choose the former with no qualms. I want results, and results aren't his brokerage statements, they are my brokerage statements. Don't show me a great trader, show me a great teacher. I guess I have this viewpoint because I was a teacher, and I saw what was most important in that field, and it was the bottom-line results for the students, that's it. Okay, go ahead and blast me, all... :-)

Keep in mind for all the above, I am talking about mentors, not chat rooms or trading services.

And I guess that anyone who truly understood the nuances of trading without being a trader and could teach would likely be very rare. So from a practical standpoint, it would be hard to find such a person amongst all the chaff, except by word of mouth from a trusted source such as a close friend. I think my issue is a logic type argument. I just don't think that there is anything about having to be a performer such that it precludes a great teacher/learning facilitator from being such in that arena, and that is what many seem to say. I like to go to specialists, and when I want to learn, I want a teacher, not a performer. I mean, are all voice coaches great singers? Some are, but some are world-renowned and can't sing at all. Enough said, it's just my opinion. All I want to do is bring forth the idea that there may be exceptions, it's not that cut and dried. But, in the real world of trading instruction, probably the best bet is along the lines of what Bruce and others say.

Maybe we can get one of these kids to teach us. Just kidding, but I was amazed at the common sense trading they exhibited. I know this may not exactly be the right thread for this, but I thought you all would enjoy it.

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/learn-how-to-invest/are-you-a-smarter-investor-than-a-5th-grader.aspx?page=1

I hear ya Jim but in the examples you site about top sports coaches etc, it is the person who they coach who becomes the reference point for the mentor themselves......in other words the coach may never have played tennis but they can help someone become a great tennis player.....this is more or less ( probably less) what you said in your post

If we equate this to the trading world then the mentor would be able to use other great traders that they trained as references.....we hear many times about traders who worked with Soros or Paul Tudor Jones etc.....

The problem arises when most of the vendors cannot point out any top trader or even a sucessful one that they trained and they themselves cannot provide any proof....It leaves us with absolutely nothing to use as a reference...

Just so I am clear as I'm obviously not a writer.....as an example.....If Bryce Gilmore could give us names of the top traders ( sucessful ones with statements) that he trained and those traders were verified to be profitable through consistent returns per year or statments or something then Bryce would have some references even though he doesn't actually trade.

I haven't seen any of the vendors I mentioned do anything close to this......if you know of any then please let me know...sometimes I think vendors just like to protect other vendors and try to dance around the logic here.


And you are right, you have your hands full on that other thread.....I shy away from the "Numbers" threads......don't get me wrong as there is much value to those but I realize for myself that I can't put certain personality traits of mine into numbers...

For example...I like to hold runners because my mind doesn't like to see the market keep moving after I exit.....Now this might not be the best thing to actually do for my account over time from a statistical basis but I know I would probably do more damage if I went "all out" and tried to re- enter....

So the numbers are great if you know your personality and they align well

Don't take it personally if I don't get involved with those.....I would just muddle up that thread...

Thanks for the feedback

Thanks for the reply, Bruce. I agree 100% with what you are saying. If someone who never traded trained some top traders, and they became the reference, or in the example I used if I saw someone train five guys I know and I then hung with them and saw what they could do and I knew them before, I could care less if the trainer has never traded even once. I'd go for the results. But, from a practical standpoint, no one is stepping up on that either, as we would expect. I just wanted to point out that it is more the type of industry this is than it is that good coaching could never come from someone who doesn't do the specific thing they train people in. Maybe it was just a philosophic point.

As far as not jumping into the numbers stuff, no worries there. Post what you like to post, I always follow your threads and enjoy them. Besides, doing what I do will only lead to a nervous breakdown, I think :-)