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Ep. 56: Steve Brechtel Interview with Michael Covel on Trend Following Radio

Steve Brechtel
Episode 56 Steve Brechtel

My guest today is Steve Brechtel. Over the past 20 years Brechtel has worked as a trader for three of the top 100 hedge funds in the world: Trout Trading (now Tewksbury Capital) in Chicago and Bermuda, Crabel Capital in Milwaukee, and now Two Sigma in NYC (a $10 billion fund) — all short-term systematic funds.

The topic is trading.

In this episode of Trend Following Radio we discuss:

  • Brechtel’s history, from his beginnings roughing it as a Pizza Hut manager while working an insurance job, to finding his way to Monroe Trout, to working at Crabel, to his career at Two Sigma today
  • History in Virginia
  • Why he was hired at Monroe Trout in the first place as a new trader and the advantages of having a beginner’s mind
  • The difference between the short term/systematic traders that Brechtel worked for and the longer term trend following Covel talks about
  • The six strategies Brechtel learned trading the pits
  • What’s changed and what’s the same now that technology has evolved
  • Ayn Rand, objectivism, and Trout
  • Brechtel’s transition from Trout to Crabel, and the differences between these two firms
  • His work at Two Sigma today
  • Brechtel’s screenplay (“Unhedged”) using hedge funds and high finance as its backdrop
  • Writing the script, how his movie differs from other Wall Street movies
  • Covel talks with him about his experience in making his own documentary, “Broke: The New American Dream”

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