Apparently the blog titled Sales Trader’s Survival Guide published earlier, touched a nerve with some folks, and as a result it looks like we’ve landed a new writer. I received feedback from a buy sider who seemed to think the posting deserved an addendum. After reading his entertaining email, I felt his buy side insight was not only on the money, but well worth sharing.
Enjoy. -Dopey
Top 10 Buy Side Trader’s Pet Peeves
- Idiotic sayings sent daily over Bloomberg that you somehow think are pithy and wise. Please stop. Please, please, I beseech you.
- Thumping your chest about the one call you got right, and asking for a “chit for your work”. Meanwhile, you conveniently overlook the fact that you got the previously 9 wrong and we had thus actually shorted your idea, thus making you a perfect 10 in our books.
- Chest-thumping addendum. Bragging about how you “Beat VWAP by 2 pennies” over the time you “worked” the order. Meanwhile, if you just bought them on the wire when I told you at the time of the order, you would have saved us a dollar. But don’t worry, that’s ok, I will just talk to my apoplectic PM and see if I can’t get my pay formula to be structured similar to Fidelity’s. Hedge funds are in the absolute return business –please do as you are told.
- Attempted Account thievery. Even though the guy who covers us at your firm is a personal friend who attended my wedding, and I traded with you, oh, say three times in three years at your old shop before you moved, you still try to steal the account. Even better, you do it by pretending to call up for “a friendly chat” and then just happen to let slip that you are “a seller of 200k INTC”. Nice work. I especially like the way you responded when I said that my dog died and you said “That’s nice, did I tell you I was a seller of Intel?”. Thanks for the shoulder pal, way to be there for me.
- Showing me flow (mostly useless) over IM for a month and then bitching about writing tickets with me. So, repeat after me (slowly for those of you who are amongst the IQ-impaired) “If you show me flow that fits, I will trade (potentially A LOT) with you. If, however, you don’t, be prepared to be consistently bagelled”
- Addendum to above. Showing me interesting flow, but then, when I choose to engage with you, explaining that “the guy is actually VWAP and just wants to piece it out”. Great, now watch me piece out the other side of the order through the machines. You want to add value ? Get the buyer/seller you allegedly control to stand still.
- After giving a broker an order to buy 50k of some liquid stock, getting the response “In here?”. No, how about plugging me up a dollar for good-times sake -jackass!
- Getting sent the same info on email and Bloomberg, followed by the “Hi, just wanted to make sure you saw my email” IM
- The phrase “Hi, I just wanted to let you know my tech analyst called yours and they had a really great talk. Seller of GM if that helps”
- Getting invited to an expensive event or dinner by someone I barely know and rarely trade with.
My all-time favorite broker “invitation” happened a few months ago. This relatively useless sales-trader at a primarily execution shop called me up and invited me to dinner at a “nice Italian restaurant”. He apologized for the late notice – the invitation was that night –and explained that one of his other clients had cancelled on him.
OK, so let me get this straight. This means one of either two things. Either you think I am so desperate for a free meal that I would endure your company for three hours or you are so desperate to get a meal on your company’s dime that you have scrolled down your customer rolodex till you got to the “sub 25k/yr accounts” in the hope that you will finally get a “Yes”. Gimme a break! Trust me buddy, if I am what you consider a “good” account, then I definitely make more money than you do and can afford to buy my own damn food.
A disgruntled client,
Red Bull
