About a couple of months ago, as I was walking through posh-looking Primrose Hill, I noticed a woman in a floral blue dress, focused with great intensity on a paperback in her hands. The book was a Penguin—easily recognisable by its distinct orange back-cover. As I’ve done many times before, almost instinctively, I glanced at the title. _Trading Game_. Cool. I’d like some finance knowledge. After all, I work in Canary Wharf. A few weeks later, I wandered into the Waterstones at Cabot Square—a store I’ve visited countless times over the past three years. Usually on Fridays, when there’s little to do. Or on any other day when there’s _too much_ to do and my possibly neurodivergent brain decides the best solution is to escape, buy a book, and work late into the night instead of during my contractual hours. There it was again, neatly stacked on one of those round tables: _Trading Game_. I picked it up and realised the actual title was _The Trading Game_. The _the_ is cleverly hidden in the _T_ of _Trading_. A pointless detail, perhaps—but funny enough to my brain that I’d missed it the first time. As usual, I flipped it over and tried to understand what the book was about based on what other readers had said. It seemed like a true story—about how the author got very rich, very fast, working in finance, and then it all came crashing down. A finance story. The word _trading_ is in the title. I assumed I’d learn a bit about that world. So I bought it—10 quid off my Waterstones loyalty card. --- The book did not teach me much about finance or trading. Sure, I encountered buzzwords like _FX trading_, _credit swaps_, and a bunch of acronyms I can no longer recall. But none of that has really percolated into my hippocampus. To be fair, Gary Stevenson—the author and protagonist—makes a formidable attempt to _cut through the financial bullshit_, a point he makes clear through his own frustration with how opaque the world of finance is. But I’m still quite green. Not as green as before I read the book. But still green. What the book _did_ offer was a vivid account of the world Gary was in. The one he came from. The one he aspired to enter. The one that changed him. Confused him. Disgusted him. Scared him. And finally, the one he left behind. It’s clear Gary is a gifted _numbers guy_, but this book proves he’s also a gifted storyteller. His experience paints finance as a rigged game—where a few big players control the system, corporations are _too big to fail_, and even the most skilled employees are ultimately _dispensable_. It reads like a modern retelling of _David and Goliath_—except this time, Goliath doesn’t lose, and David’s victory is pyrrhic. --- ### What kept me hooked to the book - **Relatability** – Gary did his undergrad at LSE and landed his first job in Canary Wharf. I did my postgrad at LSE and landed my first job in Canary Wharf. Sure, he joined trading and made over a million. I joined data analytics and still don’t know what a cash ISA is. But there’s a thread of commonality that made me want to know his story. - **Style** – The storytelling is sharp. I could clearly visualise what was happening (aside from the hardcore financial terms). And it was refreshing to see how unfiltered he was when it came to colleagues—some accounts were genuinely funny. - **Honesty** – I appreciate honest storytelling. I’m drawn to narratives that don’t shy away from human imperfection. When authors admit their flaws, it signals credibility. Gary’s honesty was one of the book’s strongest assets. --- ### Favourite phrase(s) picked verbatim from the book - *A lot of rich people expect poor people to be stupid* - *That's how people get paid you know. Clear money, next to your name. And it usually takes years to get that* - *...I spent most of my time trying to install software programs on my computer and talking to a guy named Jimmy John in Bangalore on the phone...* (this is funny to me as I come from Bangalore and the seemingly white-washed names some of the Indian employees tend to have is hilarious) - *It's not your job to rip the customers S. Your job is to rip them, and leave them smiling* - *Making money trading is not about being right. It's about being right when everyone's wrong* --- ### Word(s) I picked up from this book **Peccadillo** – A minor fault or sin. --- ### Was this worth a read? I think it’s a good read - especially if you’re interested in finance, personal narratives, or both. The financial detail might be a bit much in places despite the attempt at simplicity (which, of course, is relative). Some chapters - particularly the ones set in Tokyo when Gary was demoralised and work was slow - dragged a bit for me. But maybe that says more about my own eagerness to just _finish_ the book by then. --- ### Bonus section - New things > A section to list out all the concepts I underlined in my book at the time as things I would like to revisit at some point down the line - Credit structuring - FX trading - Collateralised loan - Two-way price - Position As of the time of writing this, I still don't know what any of these mean. I will care about these at some point later in the future. *Fin.*