This post was guest blogged by Timothy Sykes, Wall Street warrior and the author of An American Hedge Fund.
I’m incredibly proud to announce that after reading my debut book An American Hedge Fund, YOUNG MONEY Magazine decided to make me their cover story for their November 2007 issue! The article is called Wall Street’s Bad Boy, which I love, so definitely check it out. This week, my book has also helped me get cover stories on two of my hometown papers The Connecticut Business Journal and The Waterbury Republican-American. Here’s a tip, if you ever get the chance to write a book, do it and write it honestly–it’s amazing how well people respond to honesty, whether it makes or breaks your reputation. It’s even more incredible to discover that many people have trouble understanding how finance and writing from the heart could ever go hand in hand. Well, finance is no different than any other profession or hobby where if you love what you’re doing and you’re willing to learn and adapt in the pursuit of success, you’ll succeed even if you fail because you’ll be able to understand the greatest happiness stems not from the end result, but from the process itself. (Yup, I majored in philosophy in college)
With that in mind, I’d like to tell you about a project I’ve been thinking about for a while now, but only after I closed my hedge fund on October 1st, have I been able to put all the pieces together. (which, in itself, is a sad commentary on the state of industry regulations)
What I plan to do is start all over again and repeat my original feat. I’ll begin with the same $12,415 in Bar Mitzvah Gift Money I originally received back in 1999 and trade my way back up to $1.65 million dollars for a second time. I believe that everyone should be allowed to learn about financial speculation, but people need to understand the markets better instead of being fed thousands of random stock picks. The goal is to help everyone learn by laying everything out there and breaking it down to the basics and i have a feeling I might enjoy proving all my naysayers wrong 
I’m calling this challenge ‘TIM’, short for Transparent Investment Management, but I’m not taking on any investors. None. Zero investors. This is all about me teaching people through my personal stock trading. You’ll finally be able to understand strategies like short selling and scalping – I know, scary stuff, but in time, you won’t think it’s very scary any more.
I’m going to describe everything I do on TimothySykes.com. I will not give out stock picks ahead of time, instead, I’ll show everyone exactly what I’m doing so you guys can watch and interact with me while learning my strategies. The key is that I’ll hold nothing back. My every move will be open to public scrutiny. I’ll be using a regular discount online brokerage account to prove that anybody can do it. Perhaps most importantly, I’m gonna make this game fun and entertaining. So when you read this email, the challenge will have already begun–this week will be tough for me since I’m moving into my new apartment on the UES, but definitely check my website next week and after that, too–I can promise you no other financial blog will be so detailed. This is gonna get wild!
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