Comments on: An American Hedge Fund - a 5 minute review

By: Ben Storey

Ben Storey — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 16:45:51 +0000

Re: Sykes amateurish hedge fund book:

Is it more sad or amusing when someone’s young ego spurs them to write a book when they possess neither literary skill nor talent? Sykes has commented elsewhere that his goal to become “a great teacher, not a great investor” but in this sad excuse for a tutorial he proves to be neither as his amateurish errors practically drive him from the market, credibility (what little he had) completely shredded. Perhaps, however, it’s not truly his fault: let’s face it, when it comes to imparting wisdom from Wall Street it is simply not possible that a raw twenty-something simply has much to say.

Not that Sykes doesn’t try however. In perusing the “comments” portion of Amazon book reviews, he’s certainly not reluctant to chime in and offer a defense at nearly every turn. Find me ONE other author at Amazon that feels so compelled to argue his own incompetence.

Tim Sykes should end his determined quest to become a media personality as his grating manner and decidedly non-telegenic looks suit him far better to shine shoes.

By: ForexCTAs

ForexCTAs — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 06:10:13 +0000

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By: Howard Kaplan

Howard Kaplan — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 15:30:20 +0000

I read Sykes mediocre hedge fund book since I knew him at Tulane, and like him as a person. However, the book is an empty and uninspiring story about how Sykes became a self-absorbed irresponsible stock trader. This book is NOT a “classic” and story is NOT “Rocky-like”(as author Sykes claims). This book is basically like a blog of an average person who got lucky trading stocks and then his luck ran out (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.

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 game 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 -37% since Jan 2006. His continuous bad performance throughout 2007 shows that he does not learn from his mistakes; and readers can only cringe while watching Sykes slow motion demise.

By: Aaron Wormus

Aaron Wormus — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 11:44:36 +0000

The above comment has been posted to several other blogs which reviewed this book. This makes me think that the person is spamming blogs because he has a bone to pick with Tim rather than actually commenting on the reviews.

While I’m on the topic of writing, I would like to introduce our friend AJ to a part of speech commonly known as an “article”. “Articles” can be used the following ways:

that’s _a_ SIGN OF A LOSER
it might have been worth _a_ read
Many people make a fortune in _the_ markets
with _the_ same ferocity

I tried to fix “which btw doesn’t look like happening as of now” but I can’t make it sound right regardless of what I do.

Good luck with your writing - you certainly need it ;).

By: A.J.

A.J. — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 18:40:39 +0000

Tim,
It is not your LOSING MONEY but it your LOSING HEART that makes me wonder if you ARE A MAN AT ALL…

Almost every good/great trader had big losses and came back. BUT YOU SIR simply RAN away and are TRYING to FIND another profession..
that’s SIGN OF A LOSER..

If your story had shown even a slight iota of grit in you it might have been worth read.

But You are just another loser..Many people make a fortune in markets.
and as they say Markets GIVE and take back with same ferocity…

I just hope you have a better luck as a writer (which btw doesn’t look like happening as of now)