Gary Stevenson claims to have been the best trader in the world. His old colleagues disagree
https://www.ft.com/content/7e8b47b3-7931-4354-9e8a-47d75d057fff
by AdSoft6392
Gary Stevenson claims to have been the best trader in the world. His old colleagues disagree
https://www.ft.com/content/7e8b47b3-7931-4354-9e8a-47d75d057fff
by AdSoft6392
37 comments
Is he a multi-billionaire? Didn’t think so…
Best trader in the world? hahahahah
They will give anyone a column in the Grauniad, these days.
Pro-tip – don’t brag to the world when every other fucker (in an extremely competitive environment) you’ve worked with either saw your numbers or had a fairly accurate idea of the ‘conservative’ high-end for your work.
At least he isn’t positioning himself as a teacher on how to trade is he?
His book is funny and will echo the experience of anyone who has spent time on a trading floor.
I’m the greatest trader that ever lived, just don’t ask for statements or references please.
I’ve seen a few of his videos / snippets. He seems to focus on wider societal and macroeconomic issues. I’m not sure why him being a good trader means that I should listen to him any more or less than anyone tbh. I do agree with some of his arguments and not others, but whether I agree or not is fully based on the merits of the argument he makes.
Hopefully we can now move beyond the absolute brainouts thinking they know anything about economics having watched a few of his videos.
Honestly when you listen to this guy’s stories he’s making half of it up.
You start off with something half true and then use things you’ve seen around you to make it more sexy and glamorous and mad.
Anyone who believes this guy is a moron imo. I work for a hedge and surrounded by actual smart people and this guy isn’t that smart. Hell I’ll go out on a limb and say I’m smarter than this guy.
I think the reason he quit was because of a combination of he likely couldn’t handle it and had one lucky break and decided to just go out on a high. Good luck to him.
I don’t dislike the guy but he does come across as being full of shit.
It’s so easy to stretch the truth and make yourself a social media influencer nowadays. Steven Bartlett playbook. Who cares if you tell a few white lies in the process of making millions from your audience.
Out of all the people to call out – they call Gary Stevenson out?
The guy calling for investigation into where the covid money went? Investment into our people? Why our country is failing?
Is this actually happening? He’s a great guy who, given the right powers could be of great use to this country.
That took longer than expected! I’ve watched a bit of him and never heard him claim anything like he was the best trader in the world.
Why not write articles disputing what he says?
He is obviously a scammer lol, how did people not see that?
Every time I try to watch any of his videos I last about 2 minutes, he’s way too fidgety, constantly waving and moving and rocking, I cannot take it.
Sounds more like he was the best on his desk for a year. but I still like Gary. At the end of the day though he wasn’t prop trading billions so its not like he can be the BEST trader in the world literally. But its entirely possible that for a year he could have been citybank’s most popular trader
Really struggling to understand the actual point of this article. Okay so he wasn’t the best trader in the world ? So what? I don’t think that really does anything to discredit his current campaigning at all, nor does the article even try to make that argument. I’m sure he’s not the first trader to embellish the scale of their abilities in the game, nor would he be the last.
He calls himself an ‘inequality Economist’ and most of his anecdotes about his time at Citibank are used to relate the message that the people controlling vast swathes of money in our economy are actually incredibly out of touch with reality and the lives of the working class. Exaggerating his ability as a trader doesn’t really affect this at all.
To be honest, what stands out most here is the stuff they have confirmed to have happened that seemed unbelievable to start with. He did have a boss with a well known coke habit, he did get the job by winning a card game, these people really do think £35 million is spare change.
His message is generally that inequality is bad and the systems supported by the likes of Citibank seek to further entrench that inequality. A capitalist economy functions poorly when wealth distribution is this unequal and money being directed undemocratically from the top does not serve society in the way we need it to.
The biggest players in our economy being absolute clowns playing around with numbers is an actual issue with society. Democracy becomes a bit of a joke when so much of our resources in society are directed by card game winning coke fiends sat at a desk all day making money for the upper classes with no consideration at all for the wider effects of that.
It was my understanding from an interview he gave (full disclosure) that for 1 year he was the highest earning trader at Citibank. He said himself that there were guys there who earned more than him most years.
I don’t really get this. He’s not selling books on how to get rich quick or gatekeeping the secrets of successful trading.
The FT is so good at calling out celebs for their bullshit…
See the David Adjaye piece from a few years back
I mean don’t we all lie on our CVs lol? I don’t really care if he was or wasn’t the best trader itw at one point, aside from that he makes some really good point about the state of this country, wealth inequality, COVID money etc…which should be what these media houses focuses on.
It was always funny to me that some trading floor monkey at Citi managed to get himself such a huge social media following just by doing an exaggerated working class accent and saying “uwu I’m not like other bankers”
His trading experience doesn’t even have anything to do with the macroeconomic issues he likes to opine about…
When the financial media feels the need to try and take you down, you know you’re on to something.
This guy has been pushing for a wealth tax, is it any surprise they want to discredit him?
Honestly article is odd, I don’t remember the financial Times doing articles on people directly, looking through stuff that gets posted on reddit, It’s all economic/political/government stuff, this stands out like a sore thumb.
[Called it 6 months ago.](https://www.reddit.com/r/unitedkingdom/comments/1b7imeg/he_made_millions_betting_against_economic/ktlqecx/)
What he’ll do next: tell his audience that powerful, shadowy forces are working to undermine him and his message. That he knew this would happen, that the rich are worried and inevitably would look to underhand tactics to shut him down. Oh and that you can support him by subscribing and donating to the Patreon (strange that the world’s most successful trader would even need one) that he recently activated, having had it ready and waiting for months.
If you believe any of his lies or subscribe to his sixth-form analysis, you’re just a mark for this grifter.
If he is the world greatest trader why is he working for Citi Bank? Wouldn’t JP Morgan or Goldmans be the better fit for him?
Yeah! Fuck him for trying to make a living while informing people about finance. We all need to come together and help the banks for once!
Obviously embellishing stories is not good. But on the basis that he’s previously been informed that newspapers are ‘looking for dirt’ on him, and on the fact the FT have dedicated a very long article to a minor embellishment, I’d say he’s doing something right. Although pointing out fabrications is not inherently wrong, maybe the bigger picture should be a criticism of his increasingly popular macroeconomic views. After all, it’s a strange coincidence that papers like the FT and the others looking for dirt tend to prop up the wealthy that Gary is coming after.
Uh, nobody gives a shit whether he’s the “best trader in the world” or not.
His story is his credibility as an insider on ultra wealthy people who seem so alien to the rest of us normal ones. He peels back the curtain a bit and now these cunts are keen to hurl petty insults his way.
It’s like a shit episode of Billions where bad rich guy pays big publication to discredit a guy who’s saying things he doesn’t like.
He’s obviously a bit of a bulltshitter.
I saw a long form (~20min) interview him and there was so much stuff that struck off as a nonsense.
my main takeaway from this article was that a 35million pound bonus is nothing to these people
that is mental
“Best trader in the world”
Must have missed the league tables for that one
Can’t stand this guy, I can’t tell if he’s just the usual grifter praying to the ignorant or if he actually believes all the nonsense and half truths that he spouts out.
[Oh look a free copy of The Metro](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:https://www.ft.com/content/7e8b47b3-7931-4354-9e8a-47d75d057fff)
Sure, he is a good guy and ultimately who gaf about this kind of criticism, but the question unfortunately remains: why did he have to bullshit on his own status as a trader? The main point behind his message is really not about how good he was as a trader, but the lessons he learned by being inside the finance / banking echelons. He could simply have not overstated his worth and the strength of his message would have remained the very same. Now, on the other hand, we have a set of pontificating high-vision, high-level recommendations and forecasts from someone who has shown to exaggerate his own past. Not ideal tbh.
Gary “man of the people, come round for a cuppa and a chat, innit” Stevenson.
Is there a more iconoc duo than /r/unitedkingdom centrists and shitting over someone who actually wants to improve things instead of making billionaires richer?
My gripe is he talks alot. But offers no solutions. I’m not a fan of people who will show you a list of things we already know exist then say..what do we do about them? I dunno Gary you brought it up? And you’re the one with the insider knowledge?.. 🤷♂️
So here’s the thing: the modern journalism/PR game is all about sexing stuff up for engagement; if you don’t do it you can’t compete because you’re around people who lie like they breathe. For a gossip column like Alphaville to clutch their pearls at a little creative licence is rank hypocrisy.
I’m not particularly a fan of Gary, but this article is a huge misfire from the FT.
1) I don’t really recall him ever bragging or going into a lot of detail regarding his success as a trader or how he was “one of the best”?
2) folks are going to understandably and obviously point out this looks like “they” are trying to take Gary down.
He has never claimed to be the “best trader in the world” – what utter nonsense. He was the top trader in FOREX at Citibank and his primary point was that he reached that position by betting against strengthening economies via interest rates as a proxy.
Would the best trader in the world have to be in a hedge fund, stocks? FOREX isn’t going to be a billion dollar trade endeavour if the metric is overall returns EOY.
Trash tier article. Easier to pump this swill out than to engage with the ideas of inequality, a financial sector hell bent on short term profits at the expense of everything and the need for a wealth tax mechanism.