Wall Street Warriors, (Legitimately) Episode 2: Postmortem
Bess here, done with episode one and ready and raring to go with episode two. (And ready, dying, to get back to the first-person plural. I feel naked without it). If the first episode of Wall Street Warriors knocked your socks off, hold on to your pants, because episode two is like the A.D. to episode one’s B.C. WSW’s pièce de résistance. And why, pray tell? For two reasons. 1. Bob’s made it into the opening credits! And 2. Well, reason number two, is two words, friends. Reason number two is: TIM. SYKES. B’nai Mitzvah extraordinaire.
“It all happened,” Tim tells us, "freshman year." It was at this time that Sykes parlayed something around 15k of his hard earned bar mitzvah money (anyone who’s had one can tell you—Haf Torah portions are no joke) into $1.5 million. Commuting from his bedroom to his living room in little more than a robe, a tee-shirt, and—what we can assume was for our benefit—a pair of boxers, Tim laments that he’s “25 and looking for respect and hasn’t gotten any.” Then he gets to work. We’ll check back in with him later, because we’ve got some pressing matters to tend to on the Sandy front.
Sandy’s colleague, it seems, has fucked up, big time. He was supposed to send some papers last night that were necessary for her to complete a $500 million deal and, apparently, Mr. Johnny-come-lately…didn’t. We’ve never actually worked in the field so we think this is a big deal but we can’t exactly be sure. The dramatic music helps tip the scales. Back to Tim.
With terrorist threats on the Holland Tunnel, things are tense. “Everything’s going haywire,” Tim-ski informs us. “Everyone’s just shitting their pants now—it’s going to be a crazy day!” Why does it always have to be about feces with you, Sykes? This is high-definition. Let’s clean it up a bit.
In another part of town, Guy, walking down the street, checks his Blackberry and agrees. “The markets are not happy, markets are not happy at all about this.” Cue first b-roll of the episode: Guy walks down the hallway and waxes philosophically about hunkering down and not making any rash decisions. Hello, b-roll, it’s good to see you. It’s been a long time. Too long, we’d venture to say.
Facticle: Bob is a former US marine.
Tim’s got a potential investor coming over soon. So he should probably change out of his bathrobe and freshen up a bit, right? WRONG. As it turns out, the answer is not so simple because just as Tim tells us about the meeting, his short being to drop. “I’m conflicted-- do I take the meeting, which is much better in the long run ahh, I don’t know!” This getting a little too intense, even for us. A good time, we decide, to hit pause and flip over to Nip/Tuck.
And we’re back.
Bob tells us a bedtime story about losing his cool and throwing a $3,000 monitor at a fellow specialist. “I paid a $100 fine, which was fair,” he says, ruefully but not apologetically. (You don’t owe anyone anything in our book, Bob).
Back to Tim. Having decided to invest in the long run, Sykes changes out of his robe, dons a nice looking button down and slip-ons (nothing wrong with keeping it casual, people), cleans up a bit and waits for the potential investor. Alexander Morris arrives and Tim tells him, “This is where my experience comes in handy, because after 8 years of doing this crap [I know what I’m doing].” Sykes brings Morris over to his computer where, ostensibly, the magic happens and we see a shot of just their faces screaming at the monitor—“fake out, those sixes, boom!” We’re not entirely convinced they’re not playing Madden (not that there’s anything wrong with that). And not that this is evidence to the contrary but Sykes then sells his remaining shares in order to continue the meeting. (“Meeting” “Madden” same diff.).
Sandy takes her errant colleague to task: "I'm basically calling you to tell you that I'm expecting to see documents today. Let me stop you right there-- you shouldn't have told me that it was going to be ready today. To be quite honest with you I expect to see something by this afternoon." It's all said very slowly and emphatically, so that if the guy hasn't gotten it by now, he's in deep shit. Even we feel like a naughty child after this scolding.
Back to Tims. Things are not going well. We’ll let him speak for himself:
This is an endless curiosity in trying to predict the future. This is the afternoon fade that I’m talking about-- I was about two hours too early Because once it cracked 590 you can see it went straight to 550 and I did not take advantage of it I would have gotten to the 4,000 barrier that I wanted This is ridiculous I had 14,000 shares left THIS IS FUCKING PERFECT AND I JUST MISSED IT!!!You check back you check back and I said
562 close that was my call at 10 am
rewind it we can play this over and over again[editor get cute, rewinds tape, even uses that ‘rewind’ noise, for authenticity]
[Sykes, that morning:] I still fully expect this thing to tank in the afternoon.
End of the day it closes at 5.60.[Afternoon again:]
So don't fucking tell me you can’t predict where the stocks are going,
because this was fucking dead on.
This was an opportunity lost.
In the end we all learned a valuable lesson--
not to walk away from the computer
in the mid afternoon when you think there's going to be a mid afternoon fade.
That's it
Lesson learned
Good bye.
Sykes utters these last words in a tone our parents used to take when had done something "very, very bad." In fact, Sykes, like Sandy, fully succeeds in making us want to scream "You're the worst parents ever" and "We're running away from home." Unfortunately, we're gluttons for punishment-- bring on episode three.
Comments
love this feature. is dealbreaker hosting an episode three viewing party? i'll bring the popcorn!
Posted by: fan of bess | October 30, 2006 04:30 PM
I know INHD is having a cocktail party (with open bar!) for the show this Wednesday at Trinity Place
Posted by: anonymous | October 30, 2006 04:43 PM
I think Tim Sykes is a joke. He was down 5% in Sep. bringing him down more than 12% for the year. Keep it up Timmy. Hope you get another TV Show. Then maybe you will be down less than double digits. HAHAHA
Posted by: Hedge | October 30, 2006 05:13 PM
who cares if sykes is down a little for the year-he's been up big every year for a while now. everybody goes through bad times, look at bill miller.
Posted by: mike | October 30, 2006 05:29 PM
It would have been nice if they had shown more on Alexander in the episode, and maybe let him talk some more. I've come across him in the past and he's done some pretty amazing stuff. dealbreaker also did a feature on him recently. He created his own trading platform tymorapro (which you also see in the show), and he also works with an interesting multi-strategy fund of funds that seems to be doing quite nicely too.
Posted by: warrior dude | October 30, 2006 07:26 PM
I was just thinking that Tim Sykes might be the next Bill Miller. AHHHH. That's the funniest thing I've heard today. This guy is not a hedge fund manager, he's a time warp back to 1999 when every douchebag thought they were George Soros for a few months.
Posted by: joe | October 31, 2006 09:40 AM
this show: not that good.
this commentary: fucking hilarious.
Posted by: Anonymous | October 31, 2006 10:37 AM
Funny you mention Soros... that bloke is probably poking the blonde. How else did she get on this show? Sykes' character nonetheless makes for entertaining tv. He' making the most of the opportunity, probably has a good track record, and appeals to a young ambitious audience
Posted by: Anonymous | October 31, 2006 11:00 AM
They should of show more of Alex, the russian kid ,i worked with him years ago ,this guy is monster trader he hardly ever lost, and use to make 50-60k a day with little or no risk ,plus he is extremely nice guy and made all of his money without even speaking english.We use to always made fun of him at worldco our previos firm,he use to say i dont need english .He use to come in the office at 5am.Always had respect him..
Posted by: worldcotrader | November 5, 2006 04:05 PM
for all banding together and bashing of Tim Sykes, you freakin comment losers need to get a life of your own and stop focusing on the deep hatred you feel for yourself and for others. Why hate? Participate. Get on your grind and stack up some dead presidents. Start your own hedge fund, and beat Tim Sykes audited returns. Then you can talk some smack. Your mad cause he's got a little light for being an exceptional trader. grow up.
Posted by: real trader | November 15, 2006 11:42 PM
I don't quite know how to say this but the authoring of this article is similar to the scripting of Family Guy... you know the person writing it is sitting in his chair thinking "I'm so f*cking funny. Everybody loves me."
Either way, back off on Sykes. Nobody in finance has much respect for their peers anymore.
Posted by: Gecko | June 1, 2007 09:30 AM
BEWARE: Do not trust Tim Sykes with managing your money!! He has lost his investors a lot of money throughout 2006 and 2007!!
July 2007 UPDATE Tim Sykes/Cilantro Fund Audited Performance:
July2007: -1.65%
YTD2007: -10.26%
TimSykes Hedge Fund Audited Performance(3/2003-6/2007):
Compounded Annual Return: 1.52% (underperformed money market rates, with much higher risk)
Timmay Fund Sharpe Ratio (Annualized): -0.06
(may as well bet on coin flips; or give up and go on TV/self-publish etc)
Posted by: Kaplan Accounting | August 19, 2007 04:38 PM
Sykes fund hasn't made money in 4+ years.
All you ever hear is his standard line, "From 1999-2002, I made a fully audited pre-tax profit of 1.65 million".
What he doesn't tell you is that since 2003, his "fund" has returned a paltry 1.65%...and is down almost 11% this year.
After taxes and inflation, his investors have gotten crushed.
Posted by: Timmy Sucks | August 20, 2007 10:28 PM
SYKES BECOME PROFITABLE !!!!
(or close your unsuccessful Cilantro Fund)
If Sykes "hedge fund" gets profitable, then he will not need to make money selling stupid little books about all his trading mistakes!!
He has LOST Big Money 2006-2007 while doing the stupid TV and book thing!!
Posted by: Anonymous | August 23, 2007 09:43 AM
Audited Cilantro/Sykes "hedge fund" performance:
Jan2006-Jul2007: -36.06%
2007 YTDJan-Jul: -10.26%
2006 Return: -25.83%
It is incredible, since Jan 2006 Tim Sykes has lost over one third of his poor investors money!!
Posted by: Kaplan Accounting | August 26, 2007 10:07 PM
"Lucky Idiot/Sykes has his Luck Run-Out"
I've read the advance copy of book. DO NOT BUY THAT SNAKE OIL CRAP unless you like seeing a hyper idiot self-destruct......
Nothing of value in this book for any serious professional....
His "Fund" is down over -36% since Jan2006.
Posted by: Bob Cohen | September 3, 2007 11:58 AM
Just finished reading Sykes mediocre hedge fund book. Its an empty and uninspiring story about Tim Sykes, a self-absorbed irresponsible stock trader. This book is NOT a “classic” and story is NOT “Rocky-like”(as author Sykes claims).
Sykes put the term “stock operator” in title in order to confuse all future book searches for Jesse Livermore’s excellent story (Reminiscences of a Stock Operator, by Edwin Lefèvre (1923)). This cheesy trick might help book sales, but needless to say, Sykes has nothing in common with the great trader Livermore.
Sykes comes across like a hyper/immature/video player-type Trader, which worked for him for a few years; then the law of averages caught up with him. His “return to the mean” continues during the past two years; and his very poor investment strategies are DOWN -36% since Jan 2006. His continous bad performance throughout 2007 shows that he does not learn from his mistakes; and readers can only cringe while watching Sykes slow motion demise.
Posted by: Mike Fagen | September 16, 2007 11:31 AM
I purchased Sykes book and read it over the weekend. It is a poorly written life story of a failed trader who has fallen on hard times. This book is basically like a blog of an average person who got lucky trading stocks (which it really should be - blog and nothing more).
Beware of all the phony glowing reviews for Sykes Book. Its the good ole boy network in high gear where authors/investment advisers use the buddy system to give fake good reviews to each other.
Book NOT worth $20!
Better bet is to buy book - Millionaire Traders by Kathy Lien. At least you will learn something. OR Curtis Faith's book.
(I like Tim, and hope he eventually finds a career through which he can succeed).
Posted by: SykesBookNotWorth$20 | September 17, 2007 05:28 PM
It surprises me how people can have such a callous disregard for others even though they can't measure up to even half the standard of the object of their criticism. Timothy Sykes is a self made man, he's been featured on CNBC, has written and been interviewed by the WallStreet Journal, and has done a heck of a whole lot more with his life than many of you on this board. You berate him for being down one year ... when veterans like Bill Miller and Lehman Brothers have taken immense hits this year as well. Try and run a multi-million dollar business by yourself ... yes BY YOURSELF... write a book... and get recognized by the veterans of wallstreet for your trading ability and then come up here and criticize him. Half of you are probably still in highschool by the way you convey your thoughts on this messageboard!
Posted by: Goldman | September 27, 2007 01:25 PM