“Judge of a man by his questions rather than by his answers.” – Voltaire
To be exceedingly more terse than usual, it was a pivotal year. Thanks to so many of you who spent some of your precious attention with this work during 2019…
The following Alphacution Feed posts are what you – our “congregation” – valued most during 2019 (as ranked by pageviews):
- Top 100 Players in US Listed Market Structure – By a factor 2x, this post from February captured the most attention initially and throughout the year. The eye candy likely didn’t hurt…
- What Bloomberg Misses About Citadel Securities – If Alphacution’s year produced anything that could be called “viral” this one might be it; coming in 2nd place for the year after being published only 2 weeks ago on December 18th…
- Optiver, IMC and a Shout Out to AmsterdamTrader – Who would have thought Alphacution’s readership was craving such news from the Netherlands? Rest assured that 2020 will be featuring much more of the overall European structural alpha zone…
- Bridgewater Associates: Modeling Ray Dalio’s Modeling – While 2019 showcased stories of many legendary market visionaries – from the likes of Jim Simons to Stevie Cohen to (an embarrassment of) Ken Griffin – it turns out that the success and personal cache of Mr. Dalio proved more magnetic than even this exclusive roster…
- Deconstructing Citadel and Why It Matters – Alphacution is the only research and advisory group to ever publish a comprehensive case study on Citadel (and Citadel Securities) and all based on data lying around in plain sight for free. Shake, but do not stir, in a bit of creativity, experiential overlay, and love of storytelling and this theme leads those that made 2019 such a pivotal year. This post is an excerpt of that unique cocktail…
- Virtu Financial: The Frying Pan and the Fire – Second only to Citadel, Alphacution’s attention to Virtu has been an ongoing favorite among our readers. As an honorable mention, the Feed post “Virtu Financial: More Acquisitions on the Way, If…” captured the top spot (in terms of pageviews) for those published in 2018. “Frying Pan” also won Alphacution’s “Angry Tweet From A CEO” award for 2019. 😬
- Two Sigma’s Market Making Book: Hiding in Plain Sight – First, this was the beginning of what eventually became Alphacution’s monster case study on Two Sigma and its affiliates (including Two Sigma Securities). And second, it taught us never to use math symbols in a Feed post title.
- BlackRock, Bridgewater, Citadel: The Decline of Speculation at Scale – It’s long – much longer than most – and perhaps a bit complicated, but this one is the author’s pick for the year’s “Most Consequential” award…
- Welcome to Jane Street – This one is a precursor to what is likely to be Alphacution’s first major case study for 2020.
- A Message From Citadel… – As the year’s 4th title with Citadel as the central subject to make our Top 10 List, this one is unique for its leveraging of our modeling to focus more on business strategy than trading strategy…
There were many other favorites and consequential riffs that made it into these pixels over the course of 2019. Chances are quite good that they will eventually re-emerge in an expanded and re-imagined form for 2020 and beyond. Thanks again for spending some of your 2019 with Alphacution…
Until next time…
