*OT* Risky Business: 'Day Trading' on the Rise
via Washington Post
>Brenda Richardson wanted to squeeze a quick bundle out of the bull market to
help put her daughter and niece through college. So in late 1996, the Texas
pharmacist plunked down her entire savings of $10,000 to open an account at a
Houston securities firm, starting a journey that would take her deep into the
addictive world of day trading.
Richardson was given the secret code to a room full of men staring zombie-like at
computer screens flickering with stock symbols. She sat at her assigned terminal
and, without any investment experience, started buying and selling shares for
herself. "I had no idea what I was doing," she said. "I sort of looked around to
see what other people were doing."
What she witnessed was a form of high-tech gambling – traders darting in and out
of stocks in minutes, sometimes seconds, usually selling all their shares before
the day's closing bell.
Richardson said she quickly got into debt and handed over control of her account
to a sweet-talking fellow trader. He moved her account to another firm where he
was able, through excessive borrowing and wild buying and selling of shares, to
trade more than $35 million worth of stock in her name over three months.
Richardson said she ultimately lost $60,000.<
washingtonpost.com |
