Scribd
Upload
734 views

Monroe Trout - Bio

Monroe Trout is a former Harvard basketball player-turned-futures trader who has been trading successfully since 1978 based on principles of rational self-interest from Ayn Rand's objectivism philosophy. He graduated from Harvard writing his thesis on stock index futures markets and became a full-time trader in 1984. Known as a disciple of Victor Niederhoffer, Monroe managed $400 million at age 28 and founded Rand Financial Services. He is considered one of the most successful hedge fund managers, averaging 67% annual returns over 5 years with no losses and has since retired to spend more time with his family.

Uploaded by

CKachi713
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
734 views

Monroe Trout - Bio

Monroe Trout is a former Harvard basketball player-turned-futures trader who has been trading successfully since 1978 based on principles of rational self-interest from Ayn Rand's objectivism philosophy. He graduated from Harvard writing his thesis on stock index futures markets and became a full-time trader in 1984. Known as a disciple of Victor Niederhoffer, Monroe managed $400 million at age 28 and founded Rand Financial Services. He is considered one of the most successful hedge fund managers, averaging 67% annual returns over 5 years with no losses and has since retired to spend more time with his family.

Uploaded by

CKachi713
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 2

Monroe Trout - Futures trader

Monroe has been a follower of Ayn Rand's core principles since his early days of trading in 1978. At heart, this philosophy is based on the idea that our ultimate mission in life is the pursuit of our own happiness which is nothing but rationale self-interest. How much objectivism has been responsible for his success at trading is difficult to measure. By the time of his graduation from Harvard, he wrote his senior thesis on the stock index futures market (Price movements in a Stock Index Futures Market). In essence, Monroe -a former captain of the Harvard basketball team at 6'8" tall- had a clear vision he wanted to become a trader doing so full-time since 1984 both as an on-the-floor and off-the-floor trader. Cerebral Monroe Trout, a disciple of Victor Niederhoffer, seems to have retired now living in Bermuda. He mastered short term trading and strategy development. In a past Barron's story it was reported that he managed $400 million dollars at age 28. He funded Rand Financial Services, a futures/options clearing and execution firm owned by the Bermuda-based Tewksbury Investment Fund.

Milton Friedman on "greed". ---------------------------------------------------Some interesting vignettes of his trading life can be read in "Markets Wizards", like the day he was at the floor when Secretary of State James Baker had a meeting with Iraq's Foreign Minister, Tariq Azziz back in January of 1991 trying to prevent the "Gulf War". As James Baker started a press conference after such meeting announcing that "Regrettably..." markets exploded, gold, crude and refined products surged while stock indexes went catatonic and Monroe was off of $9.5 million in seconds. Which does nothing to cloud his amazing record of over a 5 year period averaging 67% per year! In the book, he explains how stops and a strict watch over limited drawdowns have contributed to his success as per one of his rules: "Close all open trades and stop trading for the rest of the day/week/month when a pre-determined portfolio drawdown is reached". Many believe Monroe has the best sharpe ratio. In January 2002, Reuters published the following about him: Monroe Trout, one of the world's most successful hedge fund managers, plans to retire from the money management business and will hand the reins of Trout Trading Management Co.Ltd. over to its CEO. The 39-year-old hedge fund manager leaves the firm after it posted a 13.6 percent gain in 2001 because he wants to spend more time with his family, the firm said on Thursday. Last year, the average hedge fund rose 4.4 percent. Matthew Tewksbury, Trout Trading's chief executive officer, will take control of the $3 billion Bermuda-based hedge fund on April 1. Tewksbury, 32, is already running the day-to-day business and Trout will continue to act as a consultant for the firm. Trout has delivered one of the industry's most enviable records, posting an average annual gain of 21.5 percent with no losses since he started the firm 14 years ago. Trout Trading trades currencies, bonds and stocks around the world.Its founder leaves the industry just as socalled global macro hedge funds are delivering the types of out-sized returns that made them famous years ago. In 2001, global macro funds topped all other strategies with an 18.4 percent gain while the average hedge fund returned 4.4 percent, according to the CSFB/Tremont Hedge Fund Index. Global macro funds turned in a dismal performance in 2000 when the industry's biggest players, George Soros and Julian Robertson, both suffered big losses. Trout -considered by some as a quant trader while others think of him as a discretionary one- is also leaving at a time many high profile hedge fund managers are closing their doors. Last year, Bowman Capital's founder

Larry Bowman said personal preferences and market pressures led him to close down his fund. But in Trout's case "this has nothing to do with bad performance, quite the opposite," a source close to the firm said on Thursday. ----Feel free to add facts and relevant trading information about Monroe below...

You might also like