The wrong answer faster
Subtitle: the inside story of making the machine that trades trillions
By: Michael Goodkin
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Published: 2012
Place of publication: Hoboken, N.J
Language: eng
ISBN-13: 9781118133408
Subjects: BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Finance; Computer programs; Investments; Biography; Investment advisors
Description: "The fascinating story behind the machines that trade trillions of dollars every day. In 1968, Michael Goodkin is about to graduate from Columbia University. While his classmates interview for jobs, he daydreams of seeing the world as a man of independent means. Noticing that there are no computers on Wall Street and drawing on his experiences as a failed teenage investor and successful gambler, he has an epiphany: since no one knows the right price for anything, the only way to beat the market is to make a computer that comes up with the wrong answer faster than the professionals. And thus begins a journey that takes this provincial Midwesterner from nearly broke to opulent Park Avenue. The Wrong Answer Faster is the story of unintended consequences: how a technique originally created to minimize market risk spiraled into a multi-trillion dollar game with unparalleled risks. Having founded and sold a firm that changed the world, Goodkin left New York to travel and play backgammon--only to return to found another groundbreaking firm, Numerix, a software company that substituted computational physics for econometrics to better manage derivative risk.  The story of the computerization of Wall Street by the man at the helm.  Packed with keen insights, based almost entirely on poker, backgammon and game theory. Goodkin's unique insight to the markets is that everyone has the wrong answers. The solution is not to try to beat the market but to come up with the wrong answers faster. The epic tale of the untold story how one man with a great idea decided not to play the market but to revolutionize the financial world for generations to come by creating the most ground breaking tool for market players since the ticker tape"--
Notes: Includes index.
Table of contents: title: Machine generated contents note: Prologue Chapter 1 High School Hustler Older Doesn't Mean Smarter, and Bigger Doesn't Mean Better My First Bank Account Working in the "Off-Season" The Bill Collector Sundays on Maxwell Street Birth of a Banker Graduation Day Chapter 2 The Late Bloomer Harvard on the Rocks Home for the Holidays The Rat Practical Developing a New Perspective Politics is Politics Moving to the Downstate Campus Leaving on a Jet Plane Chapter 3 Leading a Double Life In the Mayor's Office The Best of the Worst Preparing for the Worst Becoming a New Yorker Chapter 4 A Big Idea Still Daydreaming after All These Years The Wrong Answer Faster Mispriced Merchandise Chapter 5 Chasing Venture Capital Shelly Likes the Horse The Problem Is with the Jockey Shelly Takes a Flyer The Guy without the Money Negotiating My Terms Chapter 6 Banking the Venture Capital A Phone with a View Recruiting Shelton Meeting an Investor Quitting Time Hiring Lawyers and Accountants Money by a Nose Miles to Go Chapter 7 Stepping Out in the World Recruiting the Brain Trust I Can't Even Give It Away Worth More Dead Than Alive Chapter 8 Making the Impossible One Door Closes and Another Door Opens Turning Luck into Craft Changing Jockeys in Midstream Conducting a Symphony Orchestra Person to Person Call for Dr. Shelton Turning on the Lights Targeting the Wrong Market Chapter 9 If I Were a Rich Man Rich People Play Backgammon Entering a Parallel Universe Stretching Rubber Bands The King and I Looking in All the Wrong Places Fishing in Seattle The Best Execution in the Business Chapter 10 Too Good to be True Snagging an Invitation to London An American Capitalist in Sir Sigmund's Court The Swiss Connection Closing the Deal Creating a Competitive Bid Graduation Ceremony The Year of Transition Chapter 11 Breaking Away Backgammon and Business Not the Man I Used to Be Chapter 12 Does God Play With Loaded Dice? Back to the Futures Accessing the World of Master Physicists Examining the Dice Chapter 13 Making Physics into a Business Home Alone Seed Money The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming A Made Man IF You Build It They Will Come Running on Empty Entering the Big Leagues Everything is Connected Time to Get out of the Way Epilogue Acknowledgments Index.