RobbieG

Dave what size a guy and what age group are you BTW? SA's tend to wear best on pretty big dudes that are younger. Love the watch but despite my fairly large 7.5" wrists they look a little silly on me. They look some cool on the right wrist though. I think you have to have at least a little Hollywood/movie star potential going on to pull the SA off. I'm in my 40's I'm 5'9" and 160lbs. I kind of have a semi-gaunt-racoon-eyed-strung-out-nerdy-heroin-addict-set-the-alarm-for-the-London-open Eurotrash look to me. The SA of course doesn't really work for that. When I think of the SA I think of a kind of hip-overnight-millioned-late-20-something-6'2"-200-pound-club-owner-with-4-girlfriends-and-a-custom-chromed-out-Hummer-with-a-42"-plasma and a mini bar in it. Well?

Not to mention that you said before you think UN's are ugly to begin with - even gens, so this rep probably won't please you. UN fit and finish is going to be a tall order compared to many other super reps in my experience. UN's have that extra something that you see with VC, Patek, AP that is going to be pretty tough to get right feel wise. But I think this "looks" as good as anyone could hope for. Looks like they nailed it pretty good at first glance...

I bought this with the black dial and sent it back. UN rose gold isn't that nice. Hublot rose is much nicer if you like rich looking rose gold. As I mentioned before, UN rose gold is not far from yellow gold really.

Or either of these which tones it down a little...

Now I can spill the beans. That is the one I knew was coming but was swore to secrecy on. Looks pretty good at first glance. They did that because the A7750 is an easy fit obviously. The other good thing is the gen has kind of a fun, cheapy, cartoonish kind of vibe so it was always going to lend itself to repping well. A lot of UN purists don't like these watches as they think they are a little goofy or whatever. I'm on the fence about them. I ordered a rose gold one when they came out and sent it back. Didn't do anything for me. But alot of that had to do with teh gold. UN rose gold isn't very rosey - kind of more like yellow gold. But I don't know what I think of these. I wonder if this is it or if they will do the other dial and bezel combos and/or the bracelet. Some of them look more elegant than others. The rubber "bracelet" is the key to this particular piece so I hope thay nailed it. The gens are really nice straps! Anyway, I'm just happy that I'm not going to be the only one with a UN in the wristchecks anymore. Yeah! UN rules...

Dude, now I remember you. Look, I posted the thread to address some real problems. Actually, it just so happens that some of these economic events driving news are helping all of my funds smart guy. We trade intraday with entries and exits based on volatilty. To simplify it enough so that you can understand it we are rigged to effectively ride a "volatilty fence" intraday so as to try and not make too much on purpose and not lose more than the decided risk model for the client across all conditions present in each market since the contract inception. We also have a slant toward trading "wide open" in case trensds run big intraday so we can effectively get it all if the market gives it to us. The economic issue don't necessarily effect us all in the same way at the same time. There are a lot of angles, hence many of the responses so far. But since you seem interested in my trading success or failure as it were, fine, I'll share my year with you. Maybe you can set up your own systems and use what I say to make some money for yourself. I hope you do. I hope everyone does. It isn't easy, but I am proof it can be done... What has happened lately is that we are winning and losing the same percentages (a little less than half) and taking the same number of trades which we should as my systems are robust, but because of the volatility what is happening is we are winning as much as 10 times as much some days because of the incresed volatility. October and November of this year were by far my best ever single months in terms of absolute returns and without effecting the risk models as well I might add. Typically, our Alpha intraday S&P 500 class will make 24-60% annually levered at about 6:1 depending on conditions and was better than on track going into October of this year. And then what happened was really wonderful. We made 81% on the capital in October alone and another 33% in November. 114% in less than 40 trading days! So we will end up with a record year approaching a 160% return in this class provided December stays on track which it seems to be so far. Our max peak to value rolling drawdown capped out at 11% this year with one losing month that returned -5.2% I might add. So these aren't troubled times for us trading wise, but the world is kind of on the verge of ending and so my ability to make money in futures markets is sort of inconsequential when faced with the prospect of world currencies unraveling and states and countries going bankrupt. But in the meantime I'm sorry to disappoint you, but you won't be seeing any of my watches or cars for sale just yet. I'm set up to handle a lot of conditions and the markets are just playing right into my hand. It is a testament to having systems designed to take what comes when it does, which cannot be predicted and most importantly manage risk which mostly can be controlled - black swans aside. So good for me and good for my clients. Isn't it nice to hear someone is doing well? But the most important lesson to you is the same one I tried to teach you in that other thread. Don't go judging things you don't know about or understand after reading a few sentences. And also, what kind of person is it that roots for another man's failure or finds it funny? A lot of people are failing at trading these markets brother. It just so happens that I'm not one of them and it isn't because I'm smarter. It is because I have no overnight risk. And things will calm down for us real soon and we will go back to steady returns which are unremarkable just like everyone else. Mother Market is too smart to let anyone exploit such inefficiencies for very long. But what if I were failing? Would that make you happy? I just don't get that. I go out of my way to share my knowledge and spark interesting discussions for everyone's benefit as I appreciate when others do so for me. So show some respect for those not doing well in these markets by being happy that someone is. Why? Because that represents bankable hope in that good things are possible in all kinds of conditions. And since this is a serious topic and not one of my comedy threads do us a favor and contribute something worthwhile as Chief and many others have or don't say anything at all. These issues affect all of us including you, so again, show some respect to those who know more about it than you do. You just might learn something.

+1 on Michael Porter's work. Also I have mentioned it before but you should all check out a book called Traders, Guns, & Money which is a look into the secret wolrd of OTC trading bank to bank. It will blow your mind if you don't really know how banks trade your money...

I still like the 2006 version the best myself design and color scheme wise - and I almost bought that gen instead of the regular Ti AT chrono I have, until I made an important discovery. There is more to a watch size than a number expressed in MM's as we all know by now. but that phenomenon is big with these watches in particular. That said, I think all the specials are a little cartoonish at 44MM. Ordinarily, that isn't a big watch but in this case the "all dial" design with the internal bezel essentially appearing to be a part of the dial makes the watch wear WAY bigger. If you are a guy that loves clock watches then these are the ones to have for sure, but everyone should be aware of that phenomenon. The 42MM "Slevin" and siblings wears more like 44MM and the 44MM special edition watches wear like 46MM. Just to give those that don't own any of these reps or gens yet and are considering a purchase of any of them, here is my 42MM AT on my fairly large 7.5" wrists. Certainly doesn't wear like a typical 42MM watch...

Congrats Dave. If there is anyone on these boards who deserves this particular watch and mods it is you my friend. And yes, blue straps look like a*s unless they are quite dark. A really deep blue navy croc looks great on the right watch but the Breit rubber is too light IMO as you seem to agree. In any case enjoy the watch and wear it in good health!

Wrong thread dude, pick a funny one...

And my lead programmer did just that at my direction with his own money and did quite well. He scalped though so there was never a delivery issue. I have to say though - good catch Chief. I start these threads and I always enjoy reading how robust your understanding of all this stuff is. You should become a part of our think tank for fun and profit. Want a job?

There is nothing wrong with mark to market. We're flat and the end of the day everyday, carry no positions overnight, and "mark" as much as $20M at the end of every day when the trades settle. And if we carry overnight, trust me, the value we marked yesterday is going to be spot on the next morning. The issue is marking to market ILLIQUID instruments that nobody trades except the guys who invented the product and as such there is no REAL estimation of value. When I mark to market the end value of an S&P 500 futures contract and the current value of the index is say 850, its 850 - period. There is no debate about that so therefore, what we made is what we made (or lost). Mark to market only becomes dangerous when somebody trades some "super cross hybrid CDO merged with a swap that values to yen against the square root of his a*s" with some other guy at the same bank in a different country and then they get together and SAY something is valued at X, when in fact nobody knows what the H*LL it is, let alone what it is worth. So once again, the pikers uptown have started all these sort of wrongs about MTM without qualifying that there is a difference depending on what is being traded.

Yeah, they fly North for the winter nowadays...

Huh?

Unfortunately I can't as I do this for a living. Ignorance isn't bliss. Ignorance is stupid. Moreover, that attitude in high places is what stops problems like these from getting solved. Nobody wants to think it through and build a model that works for these times. That is sort of the point of the whole OP. People just go on the assumption that Treasuries are safe and in doing so they create a self generating prophecy that kills the instrument. Meanwhile, money hemmorages out of equities yet half the companies have cash positions greater that the entire market cap of the outstanding shares - not to mention equity. If everyone keeps sticking the proverbial head in the sand you and the rest of us are going to be hunting squirrels with rocks within five years. Sticking heads in sand is no only what got us here, but what continuies to keep us here...

In my little crew there are emails that go back and forth discussing some of the major economic and market issues everyday. Here are two of the items from one such email today... Hold on to your hats for this one: Treasuries have just dipped negative for the first time since the 20's, and yet the masses still fly to "quality" and poor their money in effectively creating a bubble that will burst and kill the only safe haven there is left. Why would anyone do that for NO RETURN - A NEGATIVE RETURN against core inflation. Are you kidding me? Bill Gross who is the best bod trader that ever lived has said that Treasury Bills at zero percent are overvalued. Anyone who thinks this isn't true relative to the RISK involved needs their head examined. Remember how I keep saying that when the currencies, specifically the dollar breaks dooms day is here. WELL THIS BUBBLE COULD BE THE ONE THAT DOES IT! You don't fly to "quality" if there is no quality just because it says T on it. The numbers don't lie. A negative return is a negative return and that ISN'T EVEN RISK ADJUSTED On to other news Goldman has just drawn a lot of heat on themselves by advising that people buy credit default swap instruments on states. You know, like they would advise doing to a stock of a failing company. What default swaps do is bet that something or somone will fail - like mortage debt as they are commonly benchmarked. In this case it means is betting that states will fail to meet debt obligations. How can this happen? Easy, the whole country would be on that list ifthe Fed didn't have the printing press. States don't have it. So who is on the list? New Jersey is at the top and they are going under soon. They are $60 BILLION IN THE HOLE in the pension fund and the Gov has said he plans on skipping payments until 2012. They just don't have the money. It is hard to believe that these times involve listing states like stock symbols on a page. A list of symbols the top investment bank is telling everyone to short sell. Are you on the list? I am... CA CT FL OH NJ NV MA MI WI

In all seriousness, if anything I said went over anyones head, please take the time to learn about it. It is so important! My main message is that when you print money to pay for problems it is only OK if you have a way to "pay back" the printing press. We never do that because we don't have ANY MONEY. We haven't for a long time as our world runs on debt. But in order for that machine to function properly it has to work just like a loan: We loan you money, you pay it back or you lose something. That concept keeps getting forgotten at government levels. So what happens eventually is that printing money causes a currency to devalue and then there is no way to fix it. The more money you print the less each bill is worth, unless you "take back" the printed money once the problem is solved so to speak. When a company crashed you can throw money at it. When an equity market crashes you can throw money at it. But when a currency crashes, you can't do a thing about it...

Actually, it is funny you should mention that because I saw him at a Sheriff's fundraiser last week. I was standing talking to a very old friend who is the right hand to the Sheriff. He looked over at me in terror thinking that I was going to get him trouble or something and I just winked at him. What he didn't know is I had told my friend the whole story before then and he asked me if I wanted him to help me squash the ticket (which meant for him to talk to the guy and tell him not to show in court - I'm not Tony Soprano and that would be the only way I could do it in my county) and I told him "No, the guys on this forum I go to think I deserve it. I better just leave it alone and pay it." But it was funny watching him watch me wondering if I was going to sell him out to the Sheriff because he figured if I knew this guy maybe I was friends with the big dog too, which I'm not...

Congrats man. Although I thought the factory AR was good enough since the AR on the gen is pretty weak to begin with. In any case, I have a 7750 waiting for the right transplant watch and you may have pushed me over the edge. I think I may get one and be your twin. Its anorexic brother needs a heavy sibling. Welcome to the club Siesta, AT's rule...

Oh yeah, I think we all do and of course there are always newer members like you who remind us of the old days. Just from reading this post one can tell you are already one of the crew and you really "get" how cool this place is and how many interesting people you meet who will go out of their way to help you. Communities like this don't grow on trees - watches aside. Always a pleasure to add new members who appreciate it as much as many of us already do.

Wow. In awe as always Kye. Amazing. You are one of a few that sex these things up enough with straps, etc. to make me wish I loved PAM's. Everytime I see a collection like this, I wish I had it even if I didn't wear them. PAM's are so cool to look at. Very cool. Kind of like abstract Italian art or something...

This can't be serious and I don't get the significance or why anyone would entertain it or think that whether he did or didn't would make any difference. He has to be thinking the same thing. Or maybe not? A garden on the White House lawn as a symbol of something? Christ. I'll tell you this: If we continue to focus on this kind of nonsense in our country instead of getting some real brains together to solve our real issues we are going to Hell in a handbasket. And we don't need to save the f'n whales or the glaciers or help the poor either. Everything and I mean everything else needs to take a back seat and come to a screeching halt until we figure out how to solve our crisises without printing reams of worthless money or being slaves to lobbyists or both. When the currency bill comes due worldwide as a side effect of all this brainless thinking we can kiss the whole world goodbye. And I mean the whole world. You think the current market selloff is remarkable. It is nothing. Not even a blip on the screen. Just fear. Blue chips have cash positions twice their market value. It isn't real. But the currency IS! Even the big three issue is a world wide one as it relates to currency.Why? Because dirty money never stays in one place. It sloshes around the whole world and gets carry traded and bundled and margined and passed between banks and hedge funds and gets soaked in blood and bile and motor oil all along the way wrecking all the other currencies along with it. LOL. The price for printed money to pay for mistakes is insanely high and the bill is coming real soon and no country can pay the bill. When it doesn't get paid we don't get like refered to a collection agency or something. The electric chair. No time for a trial. Dead. Gone. See Ya... Mark my words, when all this comes to a head noone will even remember the foolishness that started it and they will be saying things like if we had a f'n garden this never would have happened and stuff like that. Meanwhile, we will all be using jackal bones for money and a single tomato seed will be worth twice the GNP of California.

Young girls in designer jeans and too much eye make up are kind of like horses. Dumb as fenceposts but very intuitive. They may not be able to spell Versace, but they do know all the boys want to fu*k them.

Who is blustering and preening? I just stated some facts and again you help me prove a point. You stated that you incorrectly thought that I have led a "charmed" life. I refute that and tell you it is quite the contrary. I tell you that I grew up with an outhouse and yet that gets forgotten because I also named some good times to go with the bad? What would you have said if both my childhood and adult life were white trashy and I was broke now? Then would I be preening - preening about being un-successful? How about if I did grow up with a silver spoon? Would that prove to you beyond a shadow of a doubt why I get speeding tickets sometimes? The history I wrote contains hard times and good times and you only heard the good times - why? So you could keep the idea that I like to brag about myself or something alive? I have to tell you I talk to alot of people and share that info with everyone as they do with me and I have never heard anyone refer to my life story as blustering or preening before, nor have I with them. I was with a client today and he told me he just got a new (used) G5. Should I have told him to shut up and stop blustering because I can't afford one - or just because that would be evidence of why I don't like him (which I don't BTW)? But what does his fu*king plane have to do with anything? Just like the fact that I am doing well at the moment and got a ticket while driving a Porsche has nothing to do with anything. Certainly not so as to be construed as blustering or preening. So I wonder what it is like really. To read one post on an internet forum and a thread that was turning into a giant joke by a guy who admits doing it on purpose, and to really think you know something about him from it. Tell me, do you consider yourself to be intelligent? Again, I just can't imagine doing that. Makes no sense to me. So as another test I post something that you might actually use to learn something about something which has substance and no fluff and you gets absolutely nothing out of it. You continue to draw the same myopic conclusions from before. Hence the reason I posted it. I suspected that nothing would change as a result and it didn't. It baffles me it really does. But thanks for the entertainment I guess. Sigh... The point being that I wouldn't think to post my life story if I thought anyone had a genuine interest. I would use another medium - like friendship. I'm sure all of our stories are very interesting, BTW - even if mine isn't. I would love to hear your and everyone else's here to tell the truth. I find learning about people and learning in general to be fascinating. Maybe you might be evolved enough to see that I am actually not a rogue as*hat in a Porsche reeking havoc on society, but rather just a regular guy just like you with a heavy foot and sense of humor that not everyone really gets or wants to. And yet despite all the detail you still have it all drama'd up with a judge handing down a life sentence and me in leg irons married to a guy named Bubba over a traffic violation. Pretty silly don't you think?

Let's not be too quick to criticise that.