Ah, the turtle traders. The legendary experiment.
The stuff that makes the hearts of all traders tingle with excitement. No? Well, it makes me excited at least, don’t judge 🙂
The Turtle Traders Experiment
“We’re going to raise traders just like they raise turtles in Singapore.”
Set in the 1980s, Richard Dennis (one of the most successful traders back then) strongly believed that trading could be taught. When he started out his plans to teach a group of 23 people to become great traders, many were sceptical though. This is how it worked: he gathered a small group of traders – the Turtles – and gave them a 2-week training course on a simple trend following system. With these clear instructions, the turtles were given a trading account and had to trade the rules they were taught for one month. After the month, the ones that were successful were given a larger trading account from Richard’s own money to trade.
Fast-forward 5 years and his turtles had earned an aggregate profit of $175 million. The experiment was an enormous success and showed that given a simple set of rules, anyone could be made a successful trader. Some of the original turtles went on to keep trading under their own accounts and were incredibly successful at it.
