Gary Stevenson came from the wrong side of the tracks. He was kicked out of grammar school for dealing drugs. On the other hand, he seems prewired to see patterns in specific situations, which allowed him to land an unlikely gig as a trader at Citibank, and succeed beyond his wildest dreams. He worked long hours, lost touch with his friends and family, then quit. That’s the gist of this story.
What was the point? I’ve seen The Trading Game compared to The Wolf of Wall Street and Liar’s Poker, and I didn’t get any of that out of it. The Trading Game is subtitled “A Confession” and pitched like an expose, but it’s neither of those. It’s a memoir by a guy who found a job that he excelled at and nearly destroyed himself to succeed at it. It’s written in an approachable, casual way, kind of like if Mark Renton from Trainspotting got into FX trading. That’s the most redeeming feature, and even it wore thin by the end.
The first part of the book documents his schooling and the unlikely way he landed a job on at the bank. This is the most compelling part of The Trading Game: Stevenson shares his strategies that allowed him to win a Citibank internship with enthusiasm, and it’s easy to root for the guy in a sort of fish-out-of-water story.
The second part of the book is about his days at the bank: long hours, bizarre characters, tons of stress and lots of money. He doesn’t do much educating about what the job was—if I didn’t have a background in capital markets I might not have been able to figure it out. It doesn’t matter much, what’s important is that we know that his coworkers were exactly the type of people you think they are: hard-drinking sociopaths.
The highlight of this section was Stevenson’s realization that the money his team is making is coming from somewhere:
The whole thing always has to be in balance. For everyone who’s in debt, there’s someone who’s in credit. For everybody losing money, there’s somebody who’s gaining. The whole systern is designed to be in balance. Not only that, but what about the houses? What about the stock market that was rising and rising? These assets weren’t disappearing. But it we didn’t own them, it the people didn’t own them, and the governments didn’t own them …. Then who did?
This was the peak of the story. Just over halfway through. Stevenson realizes he’s the villain, so what does he do? He works there for a few more years, makes a ton more money, then quits.
Again, what is the point? Where is the confession promised in the title? Where’s the exposé?
Stevenson isn’t confessing anything: he was good at his job, apparently could see things that other traders couldn’t, and it made him rich. Cost him his health and relationships. He commits no crimes, he pushes no real boundaries. He contributes more than his fair share to the inequality he professes to be appalled by. But there isn’t much in the way of remorse or self-reflection here. He doesn’t learn anything, he doesn’t seem regretful of the role he plays in it.
It fails as an exposé even more: what did he expose? That Citibank is a capitalist enterprise, ruthless in its pursuit of profit? That people in this industry are often amoral, value money over human relationships, and measure success purely in dollar form? Not breaking any news.
Even worse, it appears that his successes aren’t quite what they seem. FT did some fact checking:
FTAV has spoken to eight former employees of Citi who worked with Stevenson at various points in his career, including some of the most senior managers in the bank’s FX business. All of them disputed his claim to have been the bank’s most profitable trader.
More than one of his former colleagues on the trading desk alleged that Stevenson had “delusions of grandeur”, while several said they doubted his record would have put him in the top 10 in Citi’s FX division at any point.
The NYT gets in on the fun too, to a lesser extent:
Speaking of omissions, there are some. Notably, right around the time that Stevenson worked at Citi, major banks were involved in a scandal around the manipulation of esoteric but crucial interest rates (Libor, for the “London Interbank Offer Rate,” and the less well-known Isdafix). These were exactly the kind of rates that are central to the working of the STIRT desk [where Stevenson worked]. Unpacking that might better help explain the extraordinary profits that Stevenson raked in — more than his broad-brush theory of global inequality.
Aside: There’s a really good book about that Libor scandal by David Enrich (Servants of the Damned) called The Spider Network. It’s a little more finance-y than this one, but it’s a true story and it’s a great read.
The last section of the book is taken up by his attempt to leave the bank. Citibank makes it hard to quit, vesting bonuses over a number of years. This is common practice, not just in banking. But Stevenson has a workaround: he’s going to work for a charity, because a clause in the contract says the company will forego the vesting timeline if he does. This leads to a protracted battle over…his bonus. Not ethics or morals. Over a million bucks.
Loath as I am to take the employer’s side, there’s little that Citibank does in this story that’s objectionable. One boss acts like a petty gangster, but it amounts to nothing. The company doctor prescribes him several months off to get well. The company offers to accomodate all of his needs, but Stevenson figures it’s a trick. When he does come back to work, he’s reassigned to a different job. He hates it.
I understand Stevenson is a good guy now, he’s an economics YouTuber and shows up on TV a lot, though I don’t think I’ve ever seen him. I’m sure he’s a lovely guy with stories that would curl my hair.
But this book is lacking in anything resembling insight – either into the practices of big finance, the world of trading, or Stevenson’s own character.
There’s really nothing to recommend about this book. Re-read Liar’s Poker and Trainspotting, and you’ll get better mileage and have more fun.
