Disqus - Latest Comments for MaskedFinancier

Re: Breathing, Drinking, Twitter, Poker, Life, Justin Bieber

MaskedFinancier — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 10:17:44 -0000

Thanks for completing the picture Howard.
And an interesting perspective on poker being a global platform, and one which I can add to my arsenal of promotional ideas for the Texas Holdem Investing concept.
Indeed, the widespread appeal of and knowledge about how to play poker is one of the reasons that I feel it is an excellent medium for helping non-investors to learn some of the critical concepts for successful investing.
And now I'm on my way to Amazon to get your book...

Re: Breathing, Drinking, Twitter, Poker, Life, Justin Bieber

MaskedFinancier — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 06:17:03 -0000

While thinking on the subject of the connection betwen poker and VC investing, I thought I would share my own thoughts about how Fred Wilson has ably commented on this connection at AVC - http://bit.ly/UmBGr.

Re: Breathing, Drinking, Twitter, Poker, Life, Justin Bieber

MaskedFinancier — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 05:18:34 -0000

Howard,
An interesting post as always.
However, as an afficionado of the link between poker and investing, including VC investing, I can't seem to find the link to poker in the article, even though it is in the title.
Perhaps I am missing something - if so please enlighten me!
Keep up the great work with StockTwits,
John (aka The Masked Financier)

Re: Wednesday links: wall of worries Abnormal Returns

MaskedFinancier — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 17:16:24 -0000

Tadas,
Many thanks for the kind link to my latest article about practice and poker - and credit where it is due to The Kirk Report for my inspiration.
I've been on a hiatus lately with my posting.
Interestingly, I am in the process of disengaging with my current partners and am involved in somewhat of my own personal "poker investing" game which is fascinating.
I will report all in due course but in the meantime thanks for the support.
Keep up your own great work,
John (aka The Masked Financier)

Re: Gambling vs. Trading

MaskedFinancier — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 08:37:06 -0000

Derek,
Thanks for the kind feedback.
Given your market expertise I don't think that learning to play poker will add to your skill base.
However, the positive expectancy element of poker is an important aspect to learn, and one of the reasons why I feel it is a good medium for learning the key skills of investing.
Based on my own professional experience of the investment markets, I do think that one can achieve even greater positive expectancy in the markets than in poker, but only if the right investing skill sets of trade selection, risk management, and emotional discipline have been acquired.
John (aka The Masked Financier)

Re: Gambling vs. Trading

MaskedFinancier — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 07:24:00 -0000

Derek,

An excellent post, and as the promoter of Texas Holdem Investing I'm always interested in people who draw attention to the links (and differences) between poker and investing.

The ability to generate positive expectancy in trading and investing is indeed a huge benefit, and as mentioned in the comments it is also a benefit to playing poker compared to the other gambling games.

As pointed out in various parts of the investing literature (cf The Market Wizards book series), some of the best investors have expectancy levels only barely greater than 50:50 (and some even worse), yet with proper risk management, and attention the incredible upside optionality available in the investment markets, good traders and investors can generate high returns.

For those readers who are interested in the similarities (and differences) between poker and investing, and how poker can teach the unitiated some of the essential skills for investing, please visit my Texas Holdem Investing site - I would welcome feedback.

Keep up the good work,
John (aka The Masked Financier)

Re: Tuesday links: historic lows Abnormal Returns

MaskedFinancier — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 12:36:51 -0000

Tadas,
I've written a follow up post to Kid Dynamite's post linked to above - you can see it at my Texas Holdem Investing site.
Thanks,
John (aka The Masked Financier)

Re: Switching My List to Aweber

MaskedFinancier — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 06:39:51 -0000

Mike,
Thanks for the feedback.
I do think that Mailchimp is indeed able to do Autoresponders - http://www.mailchimp.com/fe....
Also, they have released a Freemium version which allows 500 subscribers and the ability to send up to 3,000 emails per month - completely free, no trial period - seems like a great deal - http://www.mailchimp.com/bl...
They also have a very blue chip list of clients as you can see here: http://www.mailchimp.com/cu...

In any case, I've signed up so I might come back and update you on my experiences.
I don't use Aweber so I won't be able to do comparison.

Re: Switching My List to Aweber

MaskedFinancier — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 19:58:09 -0000

Mike,
Just came across your blog and it is excellent.
I've got alot of content on my blog but am not at the email list stage (which I know is a critical part).
However, I'm nearly there - with a free ebook ready to be distributed shortly which I hope will capture email addresses.
However, I was going to use AWeber as many people recommend but then I came across MailChimp which seems to be getting very good reviews.
Have you any opinions on MailChimp - I particularly like the first 100 contacts free option

Re: Friday links: the risk trade Abnormal Returns

MaskedFinancier — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 15:09:38 -0000

Unfortunately the finance skills didn't help Steven Begleiter win the World Series of Poker final table as he was "bad beat" out of his "winning option position" by a River Ace even though he had pocket Queens.
However, as an option play, his $10,000 "option premium" buy-in (which only actually cost him $5,000 of his own money), his $1.6 million return would make a top-tier VC envious.

Re: Poker Tips Applicable To Trading From Pro Player Annie Duke

MaskedFinancier — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 18:50:29 -0000

A fine post.
I had seen the Annie Duke video via WallStCheatSheet.
As the promoter of the Texas Holdem Investing method of learning to invest through the medium of poker, I agree with all the points on this post.
Please read more about this topic at my site - feedback would be welcome.

Re: Deep Market Thoughts…Goldman Sachs Upgrades Banks and I Downgrade SEC, Obama, Geithner, Barney Frank…

MaskedFinancier — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 16:57:57 -0000

Howard,
As a recent joiner to the Stocktwits network and a promoter of using Texas Holdem Poker as a way to teach education I find it fascinating (and I agree with you) that poker and trading (trading without the help of your in-house research team that is) are amongst the last remaining honest ways of making money through speculation.
It is interesting that in the past Mark Cuban proposed setting up a hedge fund that would seed experts at betting on sports. Part of Cuban's motivation was that for all the problems of the sports market it was far less rigged against the speculator than Wall Street.
Aaron Brown's book (The Poker Face of Wall Street) also describes how in the early days of US capitalism poker was used as a way of distributing funds to speculators who would be most effective at investing them.
Keep up the good work

Re: Recommended Reading List Joe Fahmy

MaskedFinancier — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 18:27:30 -0000

Great list Joe.
The New Market Wizards has an interview with Jeff Yass, who is famous for having set up Susquehanna with a bunch of poker fanatics. I've blogged about Yass myself recently.
Keep up the good work.

Re: Thursday links: downward drift Abnormal Returns

MaskedFinancier — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 17:14:39 -0000

Thanks for linking to my Guest Post on WallStCheatSheet about Jeff Yass, poker, options, and investing.
You can read more of my stuff on my Texas Holdem Investing blog.
Keep up the good work.

Re: David Einhorn's Greenlight Capital Loads Up On S&P500 Puts (13F Filing)

MaskedFinancier — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 20:29:30 -0000

I've just blogged at Texas Holdem Investing about how David Einhorn was able to parlay his investing skills into the capability to compete at the top of the World Series of Poker.
This path is the opposite of the Texas Holdem Investing path, where wannabe investors learn the investment mentality through playing poker, and then translate their poker skills into investment capabilities.
I welcome any feedback on the concept.

Re: Sports and Cards Analogies

MaskedFinancier — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 20:39:06 -0000

Fred's postings on poker and investing induced a flurry of creativity tonight.
I've tried to draw together all my own thoughts on Fred's articles at my blog.

http://texasholdeminvesting...

Feedback would be great (any from Fred would make me feel very honoured!), particularly given how the quality of the comments on this article make it even more effective.

Re: Sports and Cards Analogies

MaskedFinancier — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 19:11:21 -0000

As the promoter of the Texas Holdem Investing method of investor education I think that poker is in many ways one of the best ways to teach financial concepts and to teach the investing process.
You can read more about the details at the site, but to be fair many of the "analogy" issues are pointed out by Fred and also my fellow commenters.
However, one of the best elements of poker as an investment education tool is that it teaches you about risk management, and it also exposes you to the experience of losing money.
"Losses are like breathing" in trading (and investing, and venture capital investing(!)) according to Ed Seykota, and it you can't handle them you should choose another field.
I advocate playing alot of poker in a systematic fashion to help a would-be investor find out if he/she has the required risk management skills and emotional capacity to deal with monetary losses.
If you don't have the patience and skill to do this in poker then you probably won't be able to do it in investing.
On the issue of the poker not having same range of possibilities as investing, I disagree with this statement. Poker (and Texas Hold'em) in particular derives a significant element of its uncertainty from the behaviour of the other players at the game (and indeed your own behaviour). Introducing human behaviour as a variable into any situation expands the range of outcomes vastly. Thus, Texas Hold'em Poker in my humble (and masked!) opinion can provide a good approximation of the uncertainty encountered in the world of investing.
Anyway Fred, keep up the good work of explaining investing through poker (and other) analogies - it can only help improve the wider understanding of the subject, which is too often shrouded in the veil of academic terms and insider jargon, to the detriment of efficient capital allocation.

Re: Double Down, But Only On The Right Hand

MaskedFinancier — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 20:02:09 -0000

I love the references to Casino Royale, Poker, and Doubling Down in the context of business strategy.
If you ever needed backup to explain why the Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh says he learnt alot in business from poker, articles like this provide that backup.
So the question is, who has the best hand right now with the flop having being dealt (first phase of search engine development) which favours Google's hole cards, even thought Microsoft's hole cards were way stronger than Google.
Can Microsoft use its bigger stack to muscle Google out of the game, or will Google get a Turn or River card that damages the Redmond beast so much that it can't recover.
Deal those cards!!!!

Re: Thoughts on hacking finance

MaskedFinancier — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 19:03:28 -0000

My finance hack is my Texas Holdem Investing project.

Rather than getting people to read boring books about the skills needed to invest successfully, I am developing a method to help people learn to invest using Texas Holdem Poker.

It's a little old school because Aaron Brown's book - The Poker Face of Wall Street - shows how poker was used to distinguish good and bad investors out in the wild west!

Re: Startup idea #107: Using games to improve financial literacy

MaskedFinancier — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 18:49:29 -0000

This is indeed a tremendous idea in my opinion, and one that I am trying to pursue in my way with my Texas Holdem Investing startup.

When it comes to finance there are two things that children need to be taught about:
1) Managing money and debt
2) Investing

I focus on using Texas Holdem Poker to teach people how to invest.
The skills of a good poker player are very similar to the skills of a good investor.

You can see my work at my Texas Holdem Investing website.

I would appreciate any feedback or thoughts you may have.

I've only started on my project recently, so I've a long way to go.