Gambling

IdleRich

IdleRich
i thought the child prodigy/retired at 25 was exaggeration, but totally bought into you being loaded and carefree. you live in portugal, have a gorgeous russian girlfriend and go to restaurants every evening, which made it all so convincing.
Sorry to disappoint.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Who was it he claimed was taught to drum by Charles Hayward? I mean it could be true but I just assume these things are lies now...
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
I like his claims about bullying the market... but I don't think that will work in most markets cos the volume of trades is just too high and there are too many big players. Occasionally you get things like that trade when they (I want to say Citibank?) sold billions of dollars worth of bonds by accident and it smashed everything down and then they bought it back cheap, but that was a) unusual b) accidental and c) they got fined (not for the trade as such but cos it was done by a relatively junior person who shouldn't have been able to - so it was a compliance issue) and d) they pissed off loads of people who were also their clients.
 
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craner

Beast of Burden
I had to write a report about gambling addiction for work a couple of years ago. I was briefly an expert.
 

pattycakes_

Can turn naughty
I like his claims about bullying the market... but I don't think that will work in most markets cos the volume of trades is just too high and there are too many big players. Occasionally you get things like that trade when they (I want to say Citibank?) sold billions of dollars worth of bonds by accident and it smashed everything down and then they bought it back cheap, but that was a) unusual b) accidental and c) they got fined (not for the trade as such but cos it was done by a relatively junior person who shouldn't have been able to - so it was a compliance issue) and d) they pissed off loads of people who were also their clients.

Yeah that was kind of the beauty of the early years of the crypto markets. Especially for the wiser traders. Things were so liquid and loads of fresh and clueless meat was joining in every day. Daft coins like Doge with no real world potential, but enough fancy bullshit in their IPA to get a little buzz going, could easily go up 100x or even 1000x in 24 hours. Went on for years. I think that's what got Wall St interested. The BTC pump to 20k was all them afaik. The funniest part of that for me was the idea of spotty little basement dwelling 4chan kids getting insanely rich and hanging out at their local country clubs letting it all go to their heads, being demanding and beligerent. Happened a lot. Was crazy times. No idea what it's like now but I'm guessing there's probably a lot of bag holders and way less liquidity.
 

pattycakes_

Can turn naughty
Was a brilliant case study, just watching how things worked. How crazy it made people. You could literally get rich over night if you had the head, the balls and most importantly the contacts. Certain people who'd gotten crazy rich became big personalities with followings. They'd drop little hints to their fans, run private trading groups or give seminars, all that. And they'd sucker their followers into pumping whatever coin they'd been slowly buying tiny amounts of over the last 3 months for nothing. Then pump it and let the followers know after the real pump is already on the way and at least 2x what they'd been buying at so it was always a free ride. The fans then boosting the volume like crazy which attracted everyone else. Sometimes they'd time it so China would just be waking up. Then all hell would break loose and shit would explode. Sometimes they would be nice enough to tell their minions when to get out, but mostly not and they'd be left holding the bag.
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
My old man made his living from gambling. Mostly cards (blackjack and poker), but dice as well. He used to say he was a croupier but I think this was bollocks but I'm not 100% clear, still. I have lots of memories of him coming back home with thick wodges of tenners. No pension plan though and there seemed to be a stepchange at one point and the games just dried up - one of his mates commented to me that "young people just don't play cards" (whcih is true I think - certainly not non-ironically). He ended up driving a mini cab at the end of his life, which was shit.
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
He cheated like fuck as well of course. He made loaded dice and use to have a machine for bevelling cards which he used to make loaded decks. He used to sell them to people for a couple of hundred.
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
Those of you who know me IRL - Rich and Tea mainly - will have heard some of this and related stories before.
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
Might've something to do with my own attitude to work and money, which has never been that .... stable? I wonder what'd be like if I'd seen him go to work everyday
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
Likely it would have had a massive impact. My parents' attitude towards money (unlike some other things) was very cautious, and I've absorbed from that without even trying. Whereas people close to me who have had monetary instability in their upbringing...well, it's a massive thing for them as a result
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
I've never gambled, except once at the dogs. I think I am very scared that I would absorb it as an addiction...I can see that clearly in my mind's eye, especially given that the whole social world has become a massive prediction engine in the internet era (people talking more about what might happen than what does happen, journalism as the art of prediction rather than description).
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
I've got friends who bet on football. Occasionally they'll win a couple of hundred pounds. Not sure that these occasional wins outweighs their losses.
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
A friend of a friend used to earn his living on internet poker. Still possibly does. The logic was something along the lines of being careful never to overdo it on any one table, to play with relative caution and pick consistent winnings over one big landslide, and to learn to pick out the patzers. Sounds like poolsharkery when put like that.
 
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