What does it take to become a NYSE specialist, or a floor trader/broker for the big board.(short of buying your own seat)?
A fervent desire to join a dying profession?
No, it’s not that. I am just always amazed by those people. They make such astronomical amounts of money, and most of them look no older than 25. Which I figure is because 1 of 2 reasons…1) you make enough money to retire quickly, or 2) you just kill over from the shock of the large gains and losses. At either rate, they (for the most part) seem to be young…which implies, to me at least, that it’s not a profession where you have to wait a long time to work your way up.
Don’t quote me, but I believe the majority of those positions are inherited (per se). Seriously, though, those jobs will be replaced with computers sooner than you can make enough money to retire on.
Specialists are lucrative positions that is essentially heired into. I agree that it is a dying profession, but one can make a ton of money since there are a number of schemes they play.
haha, I’d love to trade in front of the central order book for a living too…
The bid-ask spreads (how they make most of their money) are much tighter versus historical levels, and these positions are definitely on their way out. But, good luck!
NYSE will never retire the specialist. It’s the reason they have an advantage over the NASDAQ and why the NYSE has been gaining market share and the NASDAQ has been losing market share…
“NYSE will never retire the specialist. It’s the reason they have an advantage over the NASDAQ and why the NYSE has been gaining market share and the NASDAQ has been losing market share…” Wow. That quote is (basically) the exact opposite of reality. That level of disinformation is indeed impressive.
rokkefella Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > NYSE will never retire the specialist. It’s the > reason they have an advantage over the NASDAQ and > why the NYSE has been gaining market share and the > NASDAQ has been losing market share… Not sure about never, but for the most part agree with above poster. There are clear benefits of having a specialist, and going automoted can have some adverse effect on exchanges (i.e. canada’s exchange system - tons of articles on this topic) such as liquidity and volatility.
Because of the specialists? I think not… And, you believe that NASDAQ has been losing market share to NYSE? I believe it’s the other way around, on top of losing ground to the global markets, especially the LSE.
DustyBallz Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > What does it take to become a NYSE specialist, or > a floor trader/broker for the big board.(short of > buying your own seat)? unfortunately this isn’t the kind of question i can answer, but i know that if i was the one that had dusty ballz, i’d have bigger issues to worry about than how to become an NYSE specialist
Seeing as the new head of the NYSE used to be the head of electronic trading at Goldman, specialists aren’t dying. They’re dead. It’s just no one’s told them yet.
Wonder if sell side analysts will follow the path of specialists in 5-10 years 
Good question. Let’s hope not for our own sakes, alright?