New infospace lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-bryan-panic-of-96.md

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+# Entity Title: Bryan Panic of ’96
+## Definition
+The Bryan Panic of 1896 was a financial crisis characterized by significant volatility and manipulation in the markets, leading to widespread impact on traders, including those in bucket shops.
+## Category
+event

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-bucket-shop-drive.md

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+# Entity Title: Bucket-Shop Drive
+## Definition
+A bucket-shop drive refers to a situation where the prices of stocks are manipulated downwards in a coordinated effort to force clients who are long on those stocks to incur losses or be wiped out.
+## Category
+strategy

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-bucket-shop.md

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+# Entity Title: Bucket Shop
+## Definition
+A bucket shop is a type of brokerage that allows speculative trading in stocks without actually buying shares. These shops often manipulate market prices to exploit their clients, leading to significant losses for traders.
+## Category
+market

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-bull-tips.md

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+# Entity Title: Bull Tips
+## Definition
+Bull tips are recommendations or information suggesting that a stock's price will rise, encouraging traders to buy. These were used strategically to influence market movements in the discussed scenario.
+## Category
+evidence_bearing_claim

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-cosmopolitan.md

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+# Entity Title: Cosmopolitan
+## Definition
+The Cosmopolitan is identified as a bucket shop that engaged in manipulative practices, specifically targeting short positions in Sugar by artificially inflating stock prices.
+## Category
+institution

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-dollar-manipulation.md

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+# Entity Title: Dollar Manipulation  
+## Definition  
+The practice of manipulating stock prices to extract profits from the market, often at the expense of average investors.  
+## Category  
+error  
+## Context  
+It underscores the dangers of participating in manipulative market practices without adequate knowledge.  
+## Source Evidence  
+"Their brokers in New York ran up the price to 108. Of course it fell right back, but Henry and a lot of others were wiped out."  
+
+---

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-market-drive.md

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+# Entity Title: Market Drive  
+## Definition  
+A tactic employed to artificially inflate or deflate stock prices in a way that leads to trader losses and profits for others.  
+## Category  
+strategy  
+## Context  
+Refers to the strategy used by operators to manipulate stock prices causing losses for long holders.  
+## Source Evidence  
+"whenever there was an unexplained sharp drop which was followed by instant recovery, the newspapers in those days used to call it a bucket-shop drive."  
+
+---

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-market-factor.md

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+# Entity Title: Market Factor
+## Definition
+A market factor is an operator or trader who significantly influences trading conditions or stock prices within the market. In the text, a certain trader is identified as a market factor due to his previous successes in market manipulation.
+## Category
+trader

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-new-york-stock-exchange.md

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+# Entity Title: New York Stock Exchange
+## Definition
+The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) is a major stock exchange where trading of stocks occurs, serving as a venue for some of the trading activities mentioned in the context of market manipulation.
+## Category
+market

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-short-position.md

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+# Entity Title: Short Position
+## Definition
+A short position refers to the practice of selling stocks that a trader does not own, with the intention of buying them back at a lower price to profit from the decline. It was a significant factor in the losses suffered by the traders in the context.
+## Category
+strategy

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-sugar-commodity.md

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+# Entity Title: Sugar (Commodity)
+## Definition
+Sugar refers to a specific commodity that is traded on the market, in this case, associated with the incident involving Tom and Henry Williams, where their positions were affected by market manipulation.
+## Category
+instrument

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-sugar.md

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+# Entity Title: Sugar  
+## Definition  
+A specific stock that traders engage with, which is central to the narratives involving trading strategies and market manipulation.  
+## Category  
+instrument  
+## Context  
+Sugar is referenced in the context of a market manipulation scheme executed by bucket shops.  
+## Source Evidence  
+"Henry Williams and I together were short six thousand shares of Sugar."  
+
+---

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-western-union-stock.md

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+# Entity Title: Western Union (Stock)
+## Definition
+Western Union is a stock that was frequently manipulated by traders due to its relative ease of movement within the market, making it a favored target for speculative trading schemes.
+## Category
+instrument

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/entities/entity-title-western-union.md

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+# Entity Title: Western Union  
+## Definition  
+A specific stock favored for trading due to its liquidity and ease of price manipulation.  
+## Category  
+instrument  
+## Context  
+Referencing a stock used strategically to execute manipulative trades benefiting the instigator.  
+## Source Evidence  
+"One of his favorite stocks was Western Union, because it was so easy to move a semiactive stock like that a few points up or down."

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-001-entities.md

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+# Entity Title: Quotation-Board Boy
+## Definition
+A role in a stock-brokerage office responsible for updating and displaying stock prices on a quotation board for customers.
+## Category
+trader
+
+# Entity Title: Tape
+## Definition
+A method of recording and displaying stock price fluctuations over time, used as a tool for traders to anticipate price movements based on historical behavior.
+## Category
+instrument
+
+# Entity Title: Stock Prices Behavior
+## Definition
+The patterns and tendencies that stock prices display during various market conditions, which can be observed and analyzed to anticipate future movements.
+## Category
+strategy
+
+# Entity Title: Observation Journal
+## Definition
+A personal record maintained by a trader, documenting stock price movements, anticipated fluctuations, and the accuracy of past observations.
+## Category
+strategy
+
+# Entity Title: Wall Street Speculation
+## Definition
+The practice of buying and selling stocks with the aim of profiting from changes in price, based on the belief that historical patterns will repeat.
+## Category
+strategy

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-001-summary.md

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+# Summary of "I Part 1"
+
+## Narrator's Actions & Market Events
+- Narrator begins working as a quotation-board boy in a stock-brokerage at a young age, quickly engaged with mental arithmetic and the constant flux of stock prices.
+- He focuses on the changing numbers, developing an interest in price behavior without understanding why they change.
+
+## Strategies, Instruments, Venues, Institutions
+- Instruments: Stocks
+- Venue: Stock market, brokerage office
+- Strategy: The narrator observes historical price behaviors to anticipate future movements, creating a personal record of stock performance.
+
+## Explicit Lessons, Rules of Thumb, Warnings
+- The tape reflects the market's real-time state, offering crucial insights for trading decisions.
+- Early lesson: "There is nothing new in Wall Street;" past patterns guide future predictions.
+- Importance of observing and recording fluctuations to refine anticipation of price movements.
+
+## Evidence Phrases
+- "seven out of ten cases"
+- "I got a little book" for tracking observations
+- Monitoring fluctuations, e.g., "behaving as it always did before it broke eight or ten points"
+
+## Ambiguities or Anachronisms
+- Lack of detail on what specific stocks were being monitored.
+- No clear time references for certain behaviors, potentially leading to confusion about the immediacy of events.

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-002-entities.md

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+# Entity Title: Burlington  
+## Definition  
+Burlington is a specific security mentioned in the context of trading, which the narrator's acquaintance believed would increase in value.  
+## Category  
+instrument  
+
+---
+
+# Entity Title: bucket shop  
+## Definition  
+A bucket shop is a trading venue where individuals bet on fluctuations in stock prices as indicated by the ticker tape, often with minimal capital.  
+## Category  
+market  
+
+---
+
+# Entity Title: trading on tips  
+## Definition  
+The practice of making trading decisions based on informal tips or advice from others, typically seen as a strategy employed by amateur traders.  
+## Category  
+strategy  
+
+---
+
+# Entity Title: speculative trading  
+## Definition  
+A method of trading where the focus is on making profit from price fluctuations rather than holding investments based on strong fundamentals or long-term growth prospects.  
+## Category  
+strategy  
+
+---
+
+# Entity Title: arithmetic trading  
+## Definition  
+A trading approach based on mathematical calculations and patterns observed in market behavior rather than on emotional or opinion-based decisions.  
+## Category  
+strategy  
+
+---
+
+# Entity Title: office-boy  
+## Definition  
+A term referring to a young individual employed in a brokerage office, in this context representing the narrator's initial role and perspective in the trading environment.  
+## Category  
+trader

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-002-summary.md

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+# I Part 2 Summary
+
+## Narrator's Actions and Market Events
+- The narrator observes market fluctuations, particularly noting Hollow Tube's three-point drop amidst a market rally.
+- He records data in a memorandum book to analyze stock behavior patterns, focusing on reading the tape.
+- Encouraged by an older office boy, he engages in trading Burlington stocks at a bucket shop to test his analytical methods.
+
+## Named Strategies, Instruments, Venues, and Institutions
+- **Trading Instruments**: Shares of Burlington.
+- **Trading Venue**: Bucket shop.
+- **Strategy**: Testing analytical accuracy through speculative trading based on observed patterns and tape behavior.
+
+## Explicit Lessons, Rules of Thumb, or Warnings
+- The narrator emphasizes the importance of testing hypotheses against real-world outcomes ("if my dope didn’t work in practice, there was nothing in the theory").
+- Encourages understanding market behavior through practice rather than mere speculation on favorites.
+
+## Evidence Phrases
+- **Market Movements**: "Hollow Tube went down three points."
+- **Trade Outcome**: "I made a profit of $3.12."
+- **First Profit Milestone**: "I was fifteen when I had my first thousand."
+- **Leniency in Experience**: "I had never bought or sold anything in my life."
+
+## Ambiguities or Anachronisms
+- The term "bucket shop" may need clarification as the concept has evolved.
+- The ambiguity of "old jiggers with oodles of dough" raises questions about the socio-economic context of the trading environment.
+- The narrator’s age and level of experience in trading might be viewed with skepticism regarding the realism of earnings figures.

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-003-entities.md

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+# Entity Title: Bucket Shops  
+## Definition  
+Bucket shops are facilities where individuals could trade stocks in small quantities, often with unscrupulous practices focused on exploiting customer behavior rather than genuine trading.  
+## Category  
+market  
+
+# Entity Title: Larry Livingston  
+## Definition  
+Larry Livingston is a pseudonym used by the narrator, who became well-known for successfully trading and defeating bucket shops.  
+## Category  
+trader  
+
+# Entity Title: Boy Plunger  
+## Definition  
+The nickname "Boy Plunger" was given to the narrator due to his aggressive trading style and ability to beat the bucket shops.  
+## Category  
+trader  
+
+# Entity Title: Cosmopolitan Stock Brokerage Company  
+## Definition  
+The Cosmopolitan Stock Brokerage Company is depicted as a large, reputable brokerage firm where the narrator eventually found a place to trade, known for its extensive business and numerous branches.  
+## Category  
+institution  
+
+# Entity Title: Margin  
+## Definition  
+Margin refers to the funds required to open and maintain a trading position, influencing the level of risk associated with trades. In this context, it reflects the narrator's experience with different amounts of capital and the behavior of risk.  
+## Category  
+evidence_bearing_claim  
+## Source Evidence  
+"If all I have is ten dollars and I risk it, I am much braver than when I risk a million..."  
+
+# Entity Title: Trading Strategy  
+## Definition  
+The narrator's approach involves starting with small positions in stocks and escalating his trades as he gains confidence, often using deception to outmaneuver brokers.  
+## Category  
+strategy  

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-003-summary.md

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+# Summary of I Part 3
+
+## Narrator's Actions and Market Events
+- The narrator reflects on their experiences trading in stock markets, particularly in bucket shops.
+- They started with a small amount of capital (e.g., fifteen dollars) and built a successful trading practice independently.
+- Initially traded with various bucket shops, switching brokers frequently due to being labeled as a successful trader ("Boy Plunger").
+- Attempted to evade detection by adopting fictitious names while trading.
+- Experienced a shutdown from a bucket shop after winning considerable amounts, prompting further attempts to trade at other branches.
+
+## Named Strategies, Instruments, Venues, and Institutions
+- Strategies: Independent trading, switching brokers to avoid limits.
+- Instruments: Stocks traded in bucket shops.
+- Venues: Various bucket shops, Cosmopolitan Stock Brokerage Company (the largest broker encountered).
+
+## Explicit Lessons, Rules of Thumb, or Warnings
+- Margin trading is risky; small fluctuations can wipe out investments.
+- Avoid sharing trading strategies or business details to maintain an edge.
+- Be mindful of reputations within trading venues; successful traders can be barred from conducting business.
+
+## Evidence Phrases
+- "I made a good living out of the stock market."
+- "Trim us out of $700!" (indicating substantial gain against the bucket shop).
+- "Cosmopolitan Stock Brokerage Company" (the largest brokerage).
+- "A-1" rating of Cosmopolitan.
+
+## Ambiguities or Anachronisms
+- The narrator’s psychological perspective on "bravery" in trading relative to their capital is subjective and should be examined critically.
+- Dates and specific events leading to changes in broker acceptance are not well defined, necessitating further inquiry into context and timelines.

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-004-entities.md

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+# Entity: Cosmopolitan Bucket Shop
+## Definition
+A trading venue characterized as the richest bucket shop in New England, offering extensive trading options including stocks, commodities, and more. It served as a last resort for traders and implemented strict margin and premium requirements that affected trading capacity.
+## Category
+market
+## Context
+The Cosmopolitan bucket shop imposed a three-point margin and a premium on trades, limiting the trading capacity of its customers. It was notable for its comprehensive quotation board and handling of various instruments across multiple exchanges.
+## Source Evidence
+"It was the richest bucket shop in New England... they put no limit on a trade... it had thousands of patrons and I really think I was the only man they were afraid of."
+
+---
+
+# Entity: Trading Premium
+## Definition
+An additional cost imposed by a broker or trading venue that increases the entry price of a security, effectively raising the breakeven point for the trader and diminishing potential profits.
+## Category
+error
+## Context
+The requirement of a premium added to the price a trader paid for a stock exaggerated the losses even when the stock increased in value.
+## Source Evidence
+"It meant that if the price was 90 when I bought... instead of making my ticket: ' Bot Steel at 90⅛ ,' it read: ' Bot Steel at 91⅛ .'"
+
+---
+
+# Entity: Margin Requirement
+## Definition
+A prerequisite where traders must deposit a certain percentage of the total trade value, reducing their capacity to trade by limiting the amount they can leverage on their balances.
+## Category
+error
+## Context
+The requirement of a three-point margin significantly reduced the trader's ability to maintain positions and limited the size of trades he could execute.
+## Source Evidence
+"they reduced my trading capacity by two-thirds."

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-004-summary.md

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+# Summary of Trading Literature - I Part 4
+
+### Narrator's Actions and Market Events
+- The narrator experienced restrictive trading conditions at the Cosmopolitan bucket shop, which imposed a three-point margin and increasing premiums on trades.
+- The narrator navigated the challenges of trading under these terms, continuing to buy and sell shares despite the limitations.
+
+### Named Strategies, Instruments, Venues, and Institutions
+- **Strategy:** Trading in bucket shops, specifically under unfavorable terms (three-point margin, increasing premium).
+- **Instruments:** Stocks (e.g., Steel).
+- **Venue:** Cosmopolitan bucket shop, the largest in New England.
+  
+### Explicit Lessons, Rules of Thumb, or Warnings
+- Beware of high premiums and margin requirements that can significantly handicap trading capacity.
+- Understand that bucket shops operate differently from traditional brokerage, often resulting in less favorable conditions for the trader.
+- Note that rapid market movements can impact trades negatively, especially when margins are tight.
+
+### Evidence Phrases
+- Mention of “Steel at 90⅛” and margins impacting ticket prices.
+- "Three-point margin" and the introduction of "a half point, then a point, and finally, a point and a half" premiums.
+- References to a “fine office” and the “largest and completest quotation board” at the Cosmopolitan.
+- The narrator alludes to being potentially the “heaviest individual trader” at the Cosmopolitan.
+
+### Ambiguities or Anachronisms
+- The terminology and practices of bucket shops may not be familiar or applicable in modern trading contexts, requiring a review for historical accuracy and relevance.
+- Clarification needed on operational specifics of the "fine office" and how it distinguishes itself from other bucket shops.

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-005-entities.md

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+# Entity: Sugar Market
+## Definition
+The Sugar Market refers to the trading environment where Sugar shares are bought and sold, particularly in the context of the trades and prices discussed.
+## Category
+market
+
+# Entity: Margin Trading
+## Definition
+Margin Trading is a practice where traders borrow funds from a broker to trade financial assets, allowing them to leverage their investments and amplify potential returns.
+## Category
+strategy
+
+# Entity: Emotional Uncertainty
+## Definition
+Emotional Uncertainty describes a psychological state where a trader feels discomfort and indecision about market conditions, leading to a withdrawal from trades despite the absence of concrete reasons.
+## Category
+psychological_pattern
+
+# Entity: The Cosmopolitan
+## Definition
+The Cosmopolitan is identified as a specific trading venue or bucket shop where informal trading of shares takes place, characterized by its unique ticketing and margin policies.
+## Category
+institution
+
+# Entity: Closing Trades
+## Definition
+Closing Trades refer to the action of finalizing a position in the trading market, in this context executed by submitting tickets to a clerk to sell shares at the prevailing market price.
+## Category
+strategy
+
+# Entity: Dave Wyman
+## Definition
+Dave Wyman is a fellow trader mentioned in the narrative who assists by calling out prices while a primary trader decides to exit a market position.
+## Category
+trader
+
+# Entity: Tommy Burnham
+## Definition
+Tommy Burnham is the clerk at the trading venue responsible for marking trade tickets, noted for his attentiveness to market signals during the trading discussion.
+## Category
+trader

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-005-summary.md

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+# Summary of I Part 5
+
+## Narrator's Actions and Market Events
+- The narrator initially had 3,500 shares of Sugar, margining with big pink tickets (five hundred shares each).
+- Market condition was soft; narrator observed price behavior and noted Sugar's decline.
+- Feeling uncomfortable with Sugar's hesitating price, the narrator decided to exit the market.
+- He delegated price calling to Dave Wyman and attempted to close his position before a potential price drop.
+
+## Named Strategies, Instruments, Venues, and Institutions
+- **Instruments**: Sugar (commodity).
+- **Venue**: Cosmopolitan bucket shop.
+- **Strategies**: Tactics for margining and early exit from trades based on price behavior and discomfort in market conditions.
+
+## Explicit Lessons, Rules of Thumb, or Warnings
+- Trust your instincts when market conditions change; discomfort can signal the need to exit a trade.
+- Observe market behavior closely and be aware of the psychological aspects of trading.
+- Do not remain in a trade without a clear understanding of why, especially when feeling uncertain.
+
+## Evidence Phrases
+- Margin amount: over **$10,000**.
+- Shares traded: **3,500 shares** of Sugar.
+- Price points: trade executed at **105¼**, sold at **103**.
+- Notable market participant: **Henry Williams** (shorting **2,500 shares** of Sugar).
+- Date and time not explicitly stated, but indicator of intra-day trading dynamics.
+
+## Ambiguities or Anachronisms
+- Vague reference to "something crooked" occurring without explicit details.
+- The term "bucket shop" might require contextual historical understanding for contemporary readers.
+- No clear timestamp or date is given for the events, which may affect chronology in relation to overall market trends or specific historical occurrences.

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-006-entities.md

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+# Entity Title: Bucket Shop
+## Definition
+A bucket shop is a type of brokerage that allows speculative trading in stocks without actually buying shares. These shops often manipulate market prices to exploit their clients, leading to significant losses for traders.
+## Category
+market
+
+# Entity Title: Sugar (Commodity)
+## Definition
+Sugar refers to a specific commodity that is traded on the market, in this case, associated with the incident involving Tom and Henry Williams, where their positions were affected by market manipulation.
+## Category
+instrument
+
+# Entity Title: Cosmopolitan
+## Definition
+The Cosmopolitan is identified as a bucket shop that engaged in manipulative practices, specifically targeting short positions in Sugar by artificially inflating stock prices.
+## Category
+institution
+
+# Entity Title: Western Union (Stock)
+## Definition
+Western Union is a stock that was frequently manipulated by traders due to its relative ease of movement within the market, making it a favored target for speculative trading schemes.
+## Category
+instrument
+
+# Entity Title: Bucket-Shop Drive
+## Definition
+A bucket-shop drive refers to a situation where the prices of stocks are manipulated downwards in a coordinated effort to force clients who are long on those stocks to incur losses or be wiped out.
+## Category
+strategy
+
+# Entity Title: New York Stock Exchange
+## Definition
+The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) is a major stock exchange where trading of stocks occurs, serving as a venue for some of the trading activities mentioned in the context of market manipulation.
+## Category
+market
+
+# Entity Title: Market Factor
+## Definition
+A market factor is an operator or trader who significantly influences trading conditions or stock prices within the market. In the text, a certain trader is identified as a market factor due to his previous successes in market manipulation.
+## Category
+trader
+
+# Entity Title: Bryan Panic of ’96
+## Definition
+The Bryan Panic of 1896 was a financial crisis characterized by significant volatility and manipulation in the markets, leading to widespread impact on traders, including those in bucket shops.
+## Category
+event
+
+# Entity Title: Short Position
+## Definition
+A short position refers to the practice of selling stocks that a trader does not own, with the intention of buying them back at a lower price to profit from the decline. It was a significant factor in the losses suffered by the traders in the context.
+## Category
+strategy
+
+# Entity Title: Bull Tips
+## Definition
+Bull tips are recommendations or information suggesting that a stock's price will rise, encouraging traders to buy. These were used strategically to influence market movements in the discussed scenario.
+## Category
+evidence_bearing_claim

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/generated/chapter-01-part-006-summary.md

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+# Summary of Trading-Literature Source: I Part 6
+
+## Narrator's Actions and Market Reactions
+- The narrator interacts with Tom, marking tickets “Closed at 103” for seven shares.
+- The narrator reacts to market movements when Dave Wyman yells about Sugar reaching 108, indicating a run on the bucket shop.
+- The narrator comments on the market manipulation by noting the price drop following the peak.
+
+## Named Strategies, Instruments, Venues, and Institutions
+- **Strategies**: Market manipulation via bucket shop tactics and coordinated buying.
+- **Instruments**: Shares of Sugar and Western Union stock.
+- **Venues**: Bucket shops, New York Stock Exchange.
+- **Institutions**: Cosmopolitan bucket shop; Tom (an employee of the shop); Dave Wyman (ticker announcer); an unnamed New York operator.
+
+## Explicit Lessons, Rules of Thumb, or Warnings
+- A run on a bucket shop can be triggered by customer suspicion, similar to a bank run.
+- Bucket shops often manipulate stock prices to eliminate losing positions of their customers.
+- Unexplained sharp price drops followed by quick recoveries are indicative of bucket-shop drives.
+
+## Evidence Phrases
+- “six thousand shares of Sugar”
+- “$20,000 in Sugar margins”
+- “doubled-cross me” and “seventy thousand dollars” (gain from the intermediary operator’s manipulation).
+- Mention of "bought as much of a certain stock" and "sold at two points profit".
+- Reference to “the Bryan panic of ’96” for context on market events.
+
+## Ambiguities or Anachronisms
+- The identity of the unnamed New York operator and his specific techniques remains vague.
+- The transition from the operator's profitable ploy to his eventual obscurity lacks clarity—why he fell into obscurity is ambiguous.
+- The term "bucket-shop drive" may need explanation or may be outdated for contemporary readers.

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/relations/chapter-01-part-001-relations.md

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+## Subject
+quotation-board boy
+
+## Predicate
+operates in
+
+## Object
+stock-brokerage office
+
+## Relation Type
+actor_venue
+
+## Evidence
+"I got a job as quotation-board boy in a stock-brokerage office."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+stock prices
+
+## Predicate
+show
+
+## Object
+certain habits
+
+## Relation Type
+cause_effect
+
+## Evidence
+"I noticed that in advances as well as declines, stock prices were apt to show certain habits."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+past performances
+
+## Predicate
+guide
+
+## Object
+anticipation of movements in prices
+
+## Relation Type
+risk_mitigation
+
+## Evidence
+"My only guide, as I say, was their past performances."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+tape
+
+## Predicate
+is
+
+## Object
+telescope
+
+## Relation Type
+lesson_evidence
+
+## Evidence
+"A battle goes on in the stock market and the tape is your telescope."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+observations
+
+## Predicate
+determine
+
+## Object
+probable movements
+
+## Relation Type
+lesson_evidence
+
+## Evidence
+"I was most interested in verifying whether I had observed accurately; in other words, whether I was right."

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/relations/chapter-01-part-002-relations.md

@@ -0,0 +1,82 @@
+## Subject
+Hollow Tube
+
+## Predicate
+went down
+
+## Object
+three points
+
+## Relation Type
+cause_effect
+
+## Evidence
+"Hollow Tube went down three points the other day while the rest of the market rallied sharply."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+directors
+
+## Predicate
+passed
+
+## Object
+the dividend
+
+## Relation Type
+cause_effect
+
+## Evidence
+"On the following Monday you saw that the directors passed the dividend."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+Burlington
+
+## Predicate
+was acting as it usually did before it went up
+
+## Object
+n/a
+
+## Relation Type
+lesson_evidence
+
+## Evidence
+"Sure enough, Burlington, according to my figuring, was acting as it usually did before it went up."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+trader
+
+## Predicate
+operates in
+
+## Object
+bucket shops
+
+## Relation Type
+actor_venue
+
+## Evidence
+"it was the ideal way to operate in a bucket shop."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+speculating
+
+## Predicate
+produced
+
+## Object
+profit
+
+## Relation Type
+strategy_outcome
+
+## Evidence
+"I made a profit of $3.12."

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/relations/chapter-01-part-003-relations.md

@@ -0,0 +1,48 @@
+## Subject
+Larry Livingston
+
+## Predicate
+operates in
+
+## Object
+bucket shops
+
+## Relation Type
+actor_venue
+
+## Evidence
+"He began in the smaller bucket shops, where the man who traded in twenty shares at a clip was suspected of being John W. Gates in disguise or J. P. Morgan traveling incognito."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+bucket shops
+
+## Predicate
+cause
+
+## Object
+loss of customer funds
+
+## Relation Type
+cause_effect
+
+## Evidence
+"There were other ways of parting customers from their money, even when they guessed right."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+Larry Livingston
+
+## Predicate
+risked
+
+## Object
+trading in the stock market
+
+## Relation Type
+strategy_outcome
+
+## Evidence
+"Anyhow, at fifteen I was making a good living out of the stock market."

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/relations/chapter-01-part-004-relations.md

@@ -0,0 +1,82 @@
+## Subject
+Cosmopolitan
+
+## Predicate
+imposed
+
+## Object
+three-point margin
+
+## Relation Type
+risk_mitigation
+
+## Evidence
+"They made me put up a three-point margin and compelled me to pay a premium at first of a half point, then a point, and finally, a point and a half."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+Cosmopolitan
+
+## Predicate
+reduced
+
+## Object
+trading capacity
+
+## Relation Type
+risk_mitigation
+
+## Evidence
+"they reduced my trading capacity by two-thirds."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+trader
+
+## Predicate
+operates_in
+
+## Object
+bucket shop
+
+## Relation Type
+actor_venue
+
+## Evidence
+"the only bucket shop that would take my business at all"
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+trader
+
+## Predicate
+experienced
+
+## Object
+ups and downs
+
+## Relation Type
+strategy_outcome
+
+## Evidence
+"Of course I had my ups and downs, but was a winner on balance."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+Cosmopolitan
+
+## Predicate
+attempted
+
+## Object
+double-cross
+
+## Relation Type
+cause_effect
+
+## Evidence
+"They tried to double-cross me."

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/relations/chapter-01-part-005-relations.md

@@ -0,0 +1,82 @@
+## Subject
+Sugar
+
+## Predicate
+was sold at
+
+## Object
+103
+
+## Relation Type
+strategy_outcome
+
+## Evidence
+"I slapped my tickets on the counter in front of the clerk and yelled, 'Close Sugar!' ... turned out to be 103 again."  
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+Margin
+
+## Predicate
+was accumulated by
+
+## Object
+trader
+
+## Relation Type
+actor_venue
+
+## Evidence
+"I was only twenty when I first accumulated ten thousand dollars in cash."  
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+thinner shoestring
+
+## Predicate
+causes
+
+## Object
+profit for bucket shops
+
+## Relation Type
+cause_effect
+
+## Evidence
+"The thinner the shoestring the better for them, for their profit lies in your being wiped."  
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+risk of trading
+
+## Predicate
+was mitigated by
+
+## Object
+leaving the market
+
+## Relation Type
+risk_mitigation
+
+## Evidence
+"I thought I ought to get out of the market ... I couldn’t spot it exactly."  
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+Cosmopolitan
+
+## Predicate
+operated in
+
+## Object
+bucket shop
+
+## Relation Type
+actor_venue
+
+## Evidence
+"the Cosmopolitan used big slips with a blank space on them where they could write down additional margin."  

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/relations/chapter-01-part-006-relations.md

@@ -0,0 +1,65 @@
+## Subject
+Bucket shop practices
+
+## Predicate
+cause
+
+## Object
+Market manipulation
+
+## Relation Type
+cause_effect
+
+## Evidence
+"If one customer gets suspicious the others follow suit... a common practice to get some broker to wash down the price of that particular stock far enough to wipe out all the customers that were long of it."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+Cosmopolitan
+
+## Predicate
+performed
+
+## Object
+Market manipulation
+
+## Relation Type
+actor_venue
+
+## Evidence
+"That was what the Cosmopolitan did to get me and Henry Williams and the other Sugar shorts."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+Agent operations
+
+## Predicate
+produced
+
+## Object
+Profit
+
+## Relation Type
+strategy_outcome
+
+## Evidence
+"A fellow told me the originator cleaned up seventy thousand dollars net, and his agents made their expenses and their pay besides."
+
+---
+
+## Subject
+New York operator
+
+## Predicate
+engaged in
+
+## Object
+Market strategies
+
+## Relation Type
+actor_venue
+
+## Evidence
+"He made a great name for himself as a bear during the Bryan panic of ’96."

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/sources/chapter-01-part-001.md

@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+# I
+
+I went to work when I was just out of grammar school. I got a job as quotation-board boy in a stock-brokerage office. I was quick at figures. At school I did three years of arithmetic in one. I was particularly good at mental arithmetic. As quotation-board boy I posted the numbers on the big board in the customers’ room. One of the customers usually sat by the ticker and called out the prices. They couldn’t come too fast for me. I have always remembered figures. No trouble at all. There were plenty of other employes in that office. Of course I made friends with the other fellows, but the work I did, if the market was active, kept me too busy from ten A.M. to three P.M. to let me do much talking. I don’t care for it, anyhow, during business hours. But a busy market did not keep me from thinking about the work. Those quotations did not represent prices of stocks to me, so many dollars per share. They were numbers. Of course, they meant something. They were always changing. It was all I had to be interested in—the changes. Why did they change? I didn’t know. I didn’t care. I didn’t think about that. I simply saw that they changed. That was all I had to think about five hours every day and two on Saturdays: that they were always changing. That is how I first came to be interested in the behaviour of prices. I had a very good memory for figures. I could remember in detail how the prices had acted on the previous day, just before they went up or down. My fondness for mental arithmetic came in very handy. I noticed that in advances as well as declines, stock prices were apt to show certain habits, so to speak. There was no end of parallel cases and these made precedents to guide me. I was only fourteen, but after I had taken hundreds of observations in my mind I found myself testing their accuracy, comparing the behaviour of stocks to-day with other days. It was not long before I was anticipating movements in prices. My only guide, as I say, was their past performances. I carried the “dope sheets” in my mind. I looked for stock prices to run on form. I had “clocked” them. You know what I mean. You can spot, for instance, where the buying is only a trifle better than the selling. A battle goes on in the stock market and the tape is your telescope. You can depend upon it seven out of ten cases. Another lesson I learned early is that there is nothing new in Wall Street. There can’t be because speculation is as old as the hills. Whatever happens in the stock market to-day has happened before and will happen again. I’ve never forgotten that. I suppose I really manage to remember when and how it happened. The fact that I remember that way is my way of capitalizing experience. I got so interested in my game and so anxious to anticipate advances and declines in all the active stocks that I got a little book. I put down my observations in it. It was not a record of imaginary transactions such as so many people keep merely to make or lose millions of dollars without getting the swelled head or going to the poorhouse. It was rather a sort of record of my hits and misses, and next to the determination of probable movements I was most interested in verifying whether I had observed accurately; in other words, whether I was right. Say that after studying every fluctuation of the day in an active stock I would conclude that it was behaving as it always did before it broke eight or ten points. Well, I would jot down the stock and the price on Monday, and remembering past performances I would write down what it ought to do on Tuesday and Wednesday. Later I would check up with actual transcriptions from the tape. That is how I first came to take an interest in the message of the tape. The fluctuations were from the first associated in my mind with upward or downward movements. Of course there is always a reason for fluctuations, but the tape does not concern itself with the why and wherefore. It doesn’t go into explanations. I didn’t ask the tape why when I was fourteen, and I don’t ask it to-day, at forty. The reason for what a certain stock does to-day may not be known for two or three days, or weeks, or months. But what the dickens does that matter? Your business with the tape is now—not to-morrow. The reason can wait. But you must act

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/sources/chapter-01-part-002.md

@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+# I
+
+instantly or be left. Time and again I see this happen. You’ll remember that Hollow Tube went down three points the other day while the rest of the market rallied sharply. That was the fact. On the following Monday you saw that the directors passed the dividend. That was the reason. They knew what they were going to do, and even if they didn’t sell the stock themselves they at least didn’t buy it. There was no inside buying; no reason why it should not break. Well, I kept up my little memorandum book perhaps six months. Instead of leaving for home the moment I was through with my work, I’d jot down the figures I wanted and would study the changes, always looking for the repetitions and parallelisms of behaviour—learning to read the tape, although I was not aware of it at the time. One day one of the office boys—he was older than I—came to me where I was eating my lunch and asked me on the quiet if I had any money. “Why do you want to know?” I said. “Well,” he said, “I’ve got a dandy tip on Burlington. I’m going to play it if I can get somebody to go in with me.” “How do you mean, play it?” I asked. To me the only people who played or could play tips were the customers—old jiggers with oodles of dough. Why, it cost hundreds, even thousands of dollars, to get into the game. It was like owning your private carriage and having a coachman who wore a silk hat. “That’s what I mean; play it!” he said. “How much you got?” “How much you need?” “Well, I can trade in five shares by putting up $5.” “How are you going to play it?” “I’m going to buy all the Burlington the bucket shop will let me carry with the money I give him for margin,” he said. “It’s going up sure. It’s like picking up money. We’ll double ours in a jiffy.” “Hold on!” I said to him, and pulled out my little dope book. I wasn’t interested in doubling my money, but in his saying that Burlington was going up. If it was, my note-book ought to show it. I looked. Sure enough, Burlington, according to my figuring, was acting as it usually did before it went up. I had never bought or sold anything in my life, and I never gambled with the other boys. But all I could see was that this was a grand chance to test the accuracy of my work, of my hobby. It struck me at once that if my dope didn’t work in practice there was nothing in the theory of it to interest anybody. So I gave him all I had, and with our pooled resources he went to one of the near-by bucket shops and bought some Burlington. Two days later we cashed in. I made a profit of $3.12. After that first trade, I got to speculating on my own hook in the bucket shops. I’d go during my lunch hour and buy or sell—it never made any difference to me. I was playing a system and not a favorite stock or backing opinions. All I knew was the arithmetic of it. As a matter of fact, mine was the ideal way to operate in a bucket shop, where all that a trader does is to bet on fluctuations as they are printed by the ticker on the tape. It was not long before I was taking much more money out of the bucket shops than I was pulling down from my job in the brokerage office. So I gave up my position. My folks objected, but they couldn’t say much when they saw what I was making. I was only a kid and office-boy wages were not very high. I did mighty well on my own hook. I was fifteen when I had my first thousand and laid the cash in front of my mother—all made in the bucket shops in a few months, besides what I had taken home. My mother carried on something awful. She wanted me to put it away in the savings bank out of reach of temptation. She said it was more money than she ever heard any boy of fifteen had made, starting with nothing. She didn’t quite believe it was real money. She used to worry and fret about it. But I didn’t think of anything except that I could keep on proving my figuring was right. That’s all the fun there is—being right by using your head. If I was right when I tested my convictions with ten shares I would be ten times more right if I traded in a hundred shares. That is

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/sources/chapter-01-part-003.md

@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+# I
+
+all that having more margin meant to me—I was right more emphatically. More courage? No! No difference! If all I have is ten dollars and I risk it, I am much braver than when I risk a million, if I have another million salted away. Anyhow, at fifteen I was making a good living out of the stock market. I began in the smaller bucket shops, where the man who traded in twenty shares at a clip was suspected of being John W. Gates in disguise or J. P. Morgan traveling incognito. Bucket shops in those days seldom lay down on their customers. They didn’t have to. There were other ways of parting customers from their money, even when they guessed right. The business was tremendously profitable. When it was conducted legitimately—I mean straight, as far as the bucket shop went—the fluctuations took care of the shoestrings. It doesn’t take much of a reaction to wipe out a margin of only three quarters of a point. Also, no welsher could ever get back in the game. Wouldn’t have any trade. I didn’t have a following. I kept my business to myself. It was a one-man business, anyhow. It was my head, wasn’t it? Prices either were going the way I doped them out, without any help from friends or partners, or they were going the other way, and nobody could stop them out of kindness to me. I couldn’t see where I needed to tell my business to anybody else. I’ve got friends, of course, but my business has always been the same—a one-man affair. That is why I have always played a lone hand. As it was, it didn’t take long for the bucket shops to get sore on me for beating them. I’d walk in and plank down my margin, but they’d look at it without making a move to grab it. They’d tell me there was nothing doing. That was the time they got to calling me the Boy Plunger. I had to be changing brokers all the time, going from one bucket shop to another. It got so that I had to give a fictitious name. I’d begin light, only fifteen or twenty shares. At times, when they got suspicious, I’d lose on purpose at first and then sting them proper. Of course after a while they’d find me too expensive and they’d tell me to take myself and my business elsewhere and not interfere with the owners’ dividends. Once, when the big concern I’d been trading with for months shut down on me I made up my mind to take a little more of their money away from them. That bucket shop had branches all over the city, in hotel lobbies, and in near-by towns. I went to one of the hotel branches and asked the manager a few questions and finally got to trading. But as soon as I played an active stock my especial way he began to get messages from the head office asking who it was that was operating. The manager told me what they asked him and I told him my name was Edward Robinson, of Cambridge. He telephoned the glad news to the big chief. But the other end wanted to know what I looked like. When the manager told me that I said to him, “Tell him I am a short fat man with dark hair and a bushy beard!” But he described me instead, and then he listened and his face got red and he hung up and told me to beat it. “What did they say to you?” I asked him politely. “They said, ‘You blankety-blank fool, didn’t we tell you to take no business from Larry Livingston? And you deliberately let him trim us out of $700!’” He didn’t say what else they told him. I tried the other branches one after another, but they all got to know me, and my money wasn’t any good in any of their offices. I couldn’t even go in to look at the quotations without some of the clerks making cracks at me. I tried to get them to let me trade at long intervals by dividing my visits among them all. But that didn’t work. Finally there was only one left to me and that was the biggest and richest of all—the Cosmopolitan Stock Brokerage Company. The Cosmopolitan was rated as A-1 and did an enormous business. It had branches in every manufacturing town in New England. They took my trading all right, and I bought and sold stocks and made and lost money for months, but in the end it happened with them as usual. They didn’t refuse my business point-blank, as the small concerns had. Oh, not because it wasn’t sportsmanship, but because they knew

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/sources/chapter-01-part-004.md

@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+# I
+
+it would give them a black eye to publish the news that they wouldn’t take a fellow’s business just because that fellow happened to make a little money. But they did the next worse thing—that is, they made me put up a three-point margin and compelled me to pay a premium at first of a half point, then a point, and finally, a point and a half. Some handicap, that! How? Easy! Suppose Steel was selling at 90 and you bought it. Your ticket read, normally: “ Bot ten Steel at 90⅛. ” If you put up a point margin it meant that if it broke 89¼ you were wiped out automatically. In a bucket shop the customer is not importuned for more margin or put to the painful necessity of telling his broker to sell for anything he can get. But when the Cosmopolitan tacked on that premium they were hitting below the belt. It meant that if the price was 90 when I bought, instead of making my ticket: “ Bot Steel at 90⅛ ,” it read: “ Bot Steel at 91⅛ .” Why, that stock could advance a point and a quarter after I bought it and I’d still be losing money if I closed the trade. And by also insisting that I put up a three-point margin at the very start they reduced my trading capacity by two-thirds. Still, that was the only bucket shop that would take my business at all, and I had to accept their terms or quit trading. Of course I had my ups and downs, but was a winner on balance. However, the Cosmopolitan people were not satisfied with the awful handicap they had tacked on me, which should have been enough to beat anybody. They tried to double-cross me. They didn’t get me. I escaped because of one of my hunches. The Cosmopolitan, as I said, was my last resort. It was the richest bucket shop in New England, and as a rule they put no limit on a trade. I think I was the heaviest individual trader they had—that is, of the steady, every-day customers. They had a fine office and the largest and completest quotation board I have ever seen anywhere. It ran along the whole length of the big room and every imaginable thing was quoted. I mean stocks dealt in on the New York and Boston Stock Exchanges, cotton, wheat, provisions, metals—everything that was bought and sold in New York, Chicago, Boston and Liverpool. You know how they traded in bucket shops. You gave your money to a clerk and told him what you wished to buy or sell. He looked at the tape or the quotation board and took the price from there—the last one, of course. He also put down the time on the ticket so that it almost read like a regular broker’s report—that is, that they had bought or sold for you so many shares of such a stock at such a price at such a time on such a day and how much money they received from you. When you wished to close your trade you went to the clerk—the same or another, it depended on the shop—and you told him. He took the last price or if the stock had not been active he waited for the next quotation that came out on the tape. He wrote that price and the time on your ticket, O.K.’d it and gave it back to you, and then you went to the cashier and got whatever cash it called for. Of course, when the market went against you and the price went beyond the limit set by your margin, your trade automatically closed itself and your ticket became one more scrap of paper. In the humbler bucket shops, where people were allowed to trade in as little as five shares, the tickets were little slips—different colors for buying and selling—and at times, as for instance in boiling bull markets, the shops would be hard hit because all the customers were bulls and happened to be right. Then the bucket shop would deduct both buying and selling commissions and if you bought a stock at 20 the ticket would read 20¼. You thus had only ¾, of a point’s run for your money. But the Cosmopolitan was the finest in New England. It had thousands of patrons and I really think I was the only man they were afraid of. Neither the killing premium nor the three-point margin they made me put up reduced my trading much. I kept on buying and selling as much as they’d let me. I sometimes had a line of 5000 shares. Well, on the day the thing happened that I am going to tell you, I was short

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/sources/chapter-01-part-005.md

@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+# I
+
+thirty-five hundred shares of Sugar. I had seven big pink tickets for five hundred shares each. The Cosmopolitan used big slips with a blank space on them where they could write down additional margin. Of course, the bucket shops never ask for more margin. The thinner the shoestring the better for them, for their profit lies in your being wiped. In the smaller shops if you wanted to margin your trade still further they’d make out a new ticket, so they could charge you the buying commission and only give you a run of ¾ of a point on each point’s decline, for they figured the selling commission also exactly as if it were a new trade. Well, this day I remember I had up over $10,000 in margins. I was only twenty when I first accumulated ten thousand dollars in cash. And you ought to have heard my mother. You’d have thought that ten thousand dollars in cash was more than anybody carried around except old John D., and she used to tell me to be satisfied and go into some regular business. I had a hard time convincing her that I was not gambling, but making money by figuring. But all she could see was that ten thousand dollars was a lot of money and all I could see was more margin. I had put out my 3500 shares of Sugar at 105¼. There was another fellow in the room, Henry Williams, who was short 2500 shares. I used to sit by the ticker and call out the quotations for the board boy. The price behaved as I thought it would. It promptly went down a couple of points and paused a little to get its breath before taking another dip. The general market was pretty soft and everything looked promising. Then all of a sudden I didn’t like the way Sugar was doing its hesitating. I began to feel uncomfortable. I thought I ought to get out of the market. Then it sold at 103—that was low for the day—but instead of feeling more confident I felt more uncertain. I knew something was wrong somewhere, but I couldn’t spot it exactly. But if something was coming and I didn’t know where from, I couldn’t be on my guard against it. That being the case I’d better be out of the market. You know, I don’t do things blindly. I don’t like to. I never did. Even as a kid I had to know why I should do certain things. But this time I had no definite reason to give to myself, and yet I was so uncomfortable that I couldn’t stand it. I called to a fellow I knew, Dave Wyman, and said to him: “Dave, you take my place here. I want you to do something for me. Wait a little before you call out the next price of Sugar, will you?” He said he would, and I got up and gave him my place by the ticker so he could call out the prices for the boy. I took my seven Sugar tickets out of my pocket and walked over to the counter, to where the clerk was who marked the tickets when you closed your trades. But I didn’t really know why I should get out of the market, so I just stood there, leaning against the counter, my tickets in my hand so that the clerk couldn’t see them. Pretty soon I heard the clicking of a telegraph instrument and I saw Tom Burnham, the clerk, turn his head quickly and listen. Then I felt that something crooked was hatching, and I decided not to wait any longer. Just then Dave Wyman by the ticker, began: “Su—” and quick as a flash I slapped my tickets on the counter in front of the clerk and yelled, “Close Sugar!” before Dave had finished calling the price. So, of course, the house had to close my Sugar at the last quotation. What Dave called turned out to be 103 again. According to my dope Sugar should have broken 103 by now. The engine wasn’t hitting right. I had the feeling that there was a trap in the neighbourhood. At all events, the telegraph instrument was now going like mad and I noticed that Tom Burnham, the clerk, had left my tickets unmarked where I laid them, and was listening to the clicking as if he were waiting for something. So I yelled at him: “Hey, Tom, what in hell are you waiting for? Mark the price on these tickets—103! Get a gait on!” Everybody in the room heard me and began to look toward us and ask what was the trouble, for, you see, while the Cosmopolitan had never laid down, there was no telling,

infospaces/lefevre-reminiscences-of-a-stock-operator/artifacts/sources/chapter-01-part-006.md

@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+# I
+
+and a run on a bucket shop can start like a run on a bank. If one customer gets suspicious the others follow suit. So Tom looked sulky, but came over and marked my tickets “Closed at 103” and shoved the seven of them over toward me. He sure had a sour face. Say, the distance from Tom’s place to the cashier’s cage wasn’t over eight feet. But I hadn’t got to the cashier to get my money when Dave Wyman by the ticker yelled excitedly: “Gosh! Sugar, 108!” But it was too late; so I just laughed and called over to Tom, “It didn’t work that time, did it, old boy?” Of course, it was a put-up job. Henry Williams and I together were short six thousand shares of Sugar. That bucket shop had my margin and Henry’s, and there may have been a lot of other Sugar shorts in the office; possibly eight or ten thousand shares in all. Suppose they had $20,000 in Sugar margins. That was enough to pay the shop to thimblerig the market on the New York Stock Exchange and wipe us out. In the old days whenever a bucket shop found itself loaded with too many bulls on a certain stock it was a common practice to get some broker to wash down the price of that particular stock far enough to wipe out all the customers that were long of it. This seldom cost the bucket shop more than a couple of points on a few hundred shares, and they made thousands of dollars. That was what the Cosmopolitan did to get me and Henry Williams and the other Sugar shorts. Their brokers in New York ran up the price to 108. Of course it fell right back, but Henry and a lot of others were wiped out. Whenever there was an unexplained sharp drop which was followed by instant recovery, the newspapers in those days used to call it a bucket-shop drive. And the funniest thing was that not later than ten days after the Cosmopolitan people tried to double-cross me a New York operator did them out of over seventy thousand dollars. This man, who was quite a market factor in his day and a member of the New York Stock Exchange, made a great name for himself as a bear during the Bryan panic of ’96. He was forever running up against Stock Exchange rules that kept him from carrying out some of his plans at the expense of his fellow members. One day he figured that there would be no complaints from either the Exchange or the police authorities if he took from the bucket shops of the land some of their ill-gotten gains. In the instance I speak of he sent thirty-five men to act as customers. They went to the main office and to the bigger branches. On a certain day at a fixed hour the agents all bought as much of a certain stock as the managers would let them. They had instructions to sneak out at a certain profit. Of course what he did was to distribute bull tips on that stock among his cronies and then he went in to the floor of the Stock Exchange and bid up the price, helped by the room traders, who thought he was a good sport. Being careful to pick out the right stock for that work, there was no trouble in putting up the price three or four points. His agents at the bucket shops cashed in as prearranged. A fellow told me the originator cleaned up seventy thousand dollars net, and his agents made their expenses and their pay besides. He played that game several times all over the country, punishing the bigger bucket shops of New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, Cincinnati and St. Louis. One of his favorite stocks was Western Union, because it was so easy to move a semiactive stock like that a few points up or down. His agents bought it at a certain figure, sold at two points profit, went short and took three points more. By the way, I read the other day that that man died, poor and obscure. If he had died in 1896 he would have got at least a column on the first page of every New York paper. As it was he got two lines on the fifth.