Trend Following With Michael Covel

Bob Enck is the CEO of Equinox Funds and has overseen all operations at the fund since March of 2007. Prior to joining Equinox Funds, Bob worked for about 20 years with large, highly regulated health care organizations including Bristol-Myers Squibb as well as with more entrepreneurial venture capital funded organizations. When was Bob exposed to trend following for the first time? What was his a-ha moment? While he was doing merger and acquisition work, a couple of his friends consistently would ask him to look over literature from their firm to get input. His first exposure to trend following came from that research. The concept of trend following clicked with him and “just made sense.” His real light bulb moment was realizing that Equinox funds could make money in up and down markets. His friends soon asked him to join their company as CEO. What is so unique about Equinox Funds? They have paved the way in researching and developing alternative investment strategies for clients through unique investment veh

Peter Leeson is an economics professor at George Mason University and is known for connecting rational choice theory with unusual domains. He looks at human behavior as a series of puzzles that are being solved by those involved. He focuses his studies on everything from bizarre rituals and superstitions to the behavior of Caribbean pirates. Peter’s work has also been quoted as “Freakonomics on steroids.” How does Peter come up with some of his “crazy” ideas? He likes to have a broad library to read from, particularly history books. As he reads he comes across a lot of practices that may seem outlandish to most, but fascinating to him. From there he digs deeper and finds meaning in certain practices through religion, economics, politics, etc. Throughout Peter’s work it is clear that the main motivator driving behavior is incentives. What happens when we have government incentives vs. private incentives? Michael and Peter finish the podcast talking government intervention, wealth creation and cultural behavior

Brooks Koepka has won three major golf championships in the last 14 months. He has had the emotional fortitude to push through the obvious pressures of being on the top, especially for being only 28 years old. Brooks wasn’t able to go pro right out of college and moved to Europe to get his PGA tour card. He wasn’t thrilled about having to go overseas to get his chance at the pros in the U.S., but with a chip on his shoulder he used that as motivation to push forward, excel and win championships. In this episode of Trend Following Radio: Emotional fortitude Operating outside the system Extreme focus Cryptocurrency crashes

Lawrence Krauss is a theoretical physicist and cosmologist, professor at Arizona State University, director of its Origins Project and author of bestselling books: “The Physics of Star Trek” and “A Universe from Nothing.” He is an advocate for science based data, public policy based on sound empirical data, and scientific skepticism. His goal is to reduce the influence of superstition and religious dogma in popular culture. His most recent book is “The Greatest Story Ever Told–So Far: Why Are We Here?” When did Lawrence first discover he was a skeptic, someone who would think outside the box? He was encouraged to think for himself from a very early age. He grew up Jewish but slowly grew out of ideas that surrounded the religion. No real a-ha moment, just gradually decided that religion wasn’t something he could believe in. In 6th grade he also began doing poorly in school. His parents moved him to a different school where he subsequently did much better. Lawrence knew that he wasn’t a different person, but it

While Michael was visiting the United States recently his assistant sent him some inspiring old Time Magazines and Saturday Evening Post Magazines. Some that particularly stood out? A 1959 Time Magazine with a story about Nicolas Darvas and a 1976 Time Magazine profiling Richard Dennis when he was 27 years old. These two men laid so much of trend following thinking and to see some original articles in print was inspiring. In this episode of Trend Following Radio: Modern American male Trend following fundamentals Philosophy behind trend following Black swans Fundamentals Ego in trading

Gabriel Radvansky studies mental model theory for human memory and cognition. He strives to understand how people create, organize, store and retrieve mental models. Also, how younger and older adults differ on their use of mental models. What triggered Gabriel to study cognition memory? He was hooked from the day he took his first introductory psychology class. His teacher’s description of what a psychologist did instantly caught his attention and from there he knew the path he wanted to go down. His original major in college was physics, he then switched to AI computer science and moved into psychology. Because of his other majors, he comes at psychology from a scientific approach. Gabriel has done extensive research on how a person’s environment changes ones memory. Why does walking through doors make you lose your train of thought? Moving from one environment to another, your brain naturally wants to leave some things behind and pick up new things. Different rooms represent different memories and your bra

Trend Following Deep Dive with Michael Covel on Trend Following Radio

Bradley Campbell is a sociologist whose research focuses on moral conflict — clashes of right and wrong and how they are handled. His work primarily looked at genocide arising from large-scale interethnic conflicts , but recently he has begun to examine smaller-scale conflicts on modern college campuses. Since about 2013 he has studied the phenomena of micro aggression complaints, calls for trigger warnings and safe spaces. He views this new era as, “Manifestations of ongoing moral change and the clash of different moral ideals.” He addresses these topics in his book, “The Rise of Victimhood Culture: Micro aggressions, Safe Spaces, and the New Culture Wars.” How did Bradley shift from macro aggression and genocide around the world to micro aggression on college campuses? He was always interested in answering, “Why do people have conflict? And what causes someone to handle that conflict in a particular way?” How are conflicts handled with the legal system? When someone has a grievance, do they avoid them? So w

“Risk Savvy: How to Make Good Decisions” by Gerd Gigerenzer is one of Michael’s favorite books from the last 10 years. Today, Michael reaches into the archives and plays an interview with Gerd Gigerenzer. Gerd is a psychologist who studies the use of bounded rationality and heuristics in decision making and investigates how humans make inferences about their world with limited time and knowledge. He is director of the Center for Adaptive Behavior and Cognition (ABC) at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and director of the Harding Center for Risk Literacy. In this episode of Trend Following Radio: Daniel Kahneman vs. Gigerenzer’s views Heuristics vs. statistics Medical check-ups Taking risks Instincts vs. expert advice Relative vs. absolute risk Benjamin Franklin’s ledger Heuristics Unconscious intelligence

Jeffrey Miron is an economist, served as chairman of the Department of Economics at Boston University, currently teaches economics at Harvard University, and holds the position of Director of Economic Policy Studies at the Cato Institute. Jeffrey came to be a libertarian from an economics standpoint rather than philosophical, with Milton Friedman at the helm of his influencers. What got Jeffrey heading down the liberty path? Economics teaches that there are unexpected consequences with interventions. Jeffrey randomly started working on drug legalization in college and came to the conclusion that ramifications of outlawing anything would apply to all markets whether it be guns or drugs. America spends about 50 billion a year as a country to fight drug laws- couple that with missing out on 50 billion a year in taxes if drugs were legalized and one can see the economic missteps. In addition, studies show there would be a decrease in crime, corruption and less interruption of people being able to use drugs medici

A Peaceful Easy Feeling with Michael Covel on Trend Following Radio.

Mark Blyth is a political scientist from Scotland and a professor of international political economy at Brown University. What influenced Mark early on? John Maynard Keynes was his foundation. He also was growing up through the permanent recessions of the 1980’s and learning first hand about pitfalls in the economy. He quickly saw how the macro economy was so much different than the micro and how studying the economy as a whole was more important than just looking at the individual. Mark called the Donald Trump win for Presidency in June of 2016. Why? Trump was willing to acknowledge there was a problem. He was dramatically different and played to the individual rather than big business. In 2015 Wall Street bonuses were twice the amount of the total wages of people earning minimum wage. Since that 2015 statistic, the inequality has only gotten greater. Trump gave people hope that things can change – that he could change them. What are some macro steps that can get the U.S. economy heading in the right directi

Markets and Profit with Michael Covel on Trend Following Radio.

Jerry Muller is a professor of history at The Catholic University of America, where he has taught since 1984. His latest book is “The Tyranny of Metrics.” Quantifying metrics can be a good thing, however, it can easily go too far and have great consequences. Jerry sees pitfalls of focusing too much on metrics everywhere – schools, hospitals, even venture capital. Children gear their learning toward beating a test rather than intellectually developing their mind. Doctors fixate on standardized performance measures, rewards and punishment, and publicized accountability. The system encourages and sometimes requires doctors to game the system. Venture capitalism, the very field where creativity should prosper, tends to foster an anti-creative atmosphere. Investors want to see data to back up a new product so they can see proof of a future profit. The problem? New innovations don’t have data because they have never been seen before in the marketplace. Using metrics in schools, hospitals, and business can be extrem

Michael plays three epic interviews with Ed Seykota, Martin Lueck and Jean-Philippe Bouchaud profiled in chapter’s 12, 13 and 14 of his newest edition of Trend Following: How to Make a Fortune in Bull, Bear and Black Swan Markets. Ed Seykota was originally profiled in the classic book “The Market Wizards.” Seykota has played a pivotal role in the growth of trend following trading for 40 years. Martin Lueck holds an M.A. in Physics from Oxford University and currently is the Research Director and President of Aspect Capital. Lueck was originally with Adam, Harding and Lueck Limited (AHL), which he co-founded with Michael Adam and David Harding. Jean-Philippe Bouchaud is founder and Chairman of Capital Fund Management (CFM) and professor of physics at École polytechnique. In this episode of Trend Following Radio: Govopoly Systems trading Diversification Behavioral economics Death of trend following Exploiting vs. exploring Behavioral biases Risk

Christopher Ryan is best known for co-authoring “Sex at Dawn.” The book deals with the evolution of monogamy in humans and human mating systems. In opposition to what the authors see as the “standard narrative” of human sexual evolution, they contend that having multiple sexual partners was common and accepted in the environment of evolutionary adaptedness. What was the start of Christopher going doing his path? One of the more pivotal moments was when he was an undergraduate in college. He was able to skip his junior year of college and subsequently hitchhiked to Alaska. Before that journey to Alaska, he thought the world was a dangerous place. Once he got outside his bubble and met strangers, he learned how kind and generous people were. It shifted the way he thought about life and the world. After graduating he spent his 20’s and 30’s backpacking through Asia and South America. His a-ha moment was realizing that most of what he was told about the world was bullshit. Governments have an agenda and prop up t

Michael shares the Preface and Chapter One of his book, “The Complete TurtleTrader.” “The Complete TurtleTrader” is a classic nature vs. nurture story starring famed traders Richard Dennis and Bill Eckhardt. Are people born with the innate ability to trade? Or can it be taught? Dennis believed that anyone could be taught to trade successful with the right set of rules, Eckhardt disagreed – and from there this epic experiment was born. These men took 23 novice traders, gave them millions and taught them how to be successful on Wall Street. In this episode of Trend Following Radio: Nature vs. Nurture Efficient markets Beating the market Systems trading Behavioral finance

Bryan Caplan is an economist and professor of economics at George Mason University, research fellow at the Mercatus Center, adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute, and blogger for EconLog. Bryan has written several books–his newest being “The Case against Education: Why the Education System Is a Waste of Time and Money.” His main goal for the book is for people to forget education propaganda, look at what is right in front of them and examine what they have learned first hand. From a young age Bryan always wondered, “Why do I need to learn this stuff? I am never going to use it.” The further he got along in school the more passionate he became about that belief. Yet it wasn’t until he started studying economics that he found there were other like-minded people who thought how he was thinking. What is the problem with everyone getting a college degree? To stand out you now need to get another degree. Credential inflation has only gone up. People are spending too many years studying subjects that do not interest

53% of Millennials expect to become a millionaire at some point in their life. That is a lot of optimism without a lot of math. Building off that survey Michael quotes some research from a man named Ned Davis titled “Was I too Correct for My Own Good.” Ned is more pessimistic than the Millennials. He see’s the present economy as an uphill battle for making money rather than Millennials who think the money will just fall from the tree’s. If you can stand outside the crowd and accept the notion of failure you have a great opportunity to succeed over the course of a lifetime. Imagining you are going to make a million dollars without a process is obtuse. Have a good process and stick with it. Michael ends with wisdom from “The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety” by Alan Watts.

Harvey Silverglate is an events attorney with 51 years of experience practicing in courts throughout the country. Harvey is the co-founder of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education where he serves as the current Chairman of the Board of Directors. He is also author of “Three Felonies A Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent.” What is Harvey’s current view on the President? He is not a Trump supporter, but does not agree with Robert Mueller and how the legal system is systematically trying to pin him. What Trump has done may be politically unpalatable to some, but he is not doing anything illegal. Harvey uses Mueller to show how an overreaching prosecutor bent on getting his agenda done–get’s it done. Justice, for the most part, has nothing to do with the American legal system today. Harvey feels we are in an era where people look at the law in an objective way rather than with passion. Colleges pump out politically correct lawyers afraid of standing for what they believe in. Harvey is fighting to re