Olivia
Online
Crypto Optimus
@optimis_optimus
Quant | CS Grad | DTU Alumnus
Joined January 2018
1.2K Following
90 Followers
1.7K Posts
https://t.co/pDxfCm70rE
THE RAW TRUTH - WHY I SELL A TRADING COURSE!
The common reaction (mine included) is: “If you’re actually so great of a trader, why would you sell a course?” Why is a supposedly "elite" trader openly sharing his knowledge or doing any of this at all!?
The assumption is I must be a fraud, broke (lol), or washed up.
1. First raw truth - I no longer am willing to pay the physical, psychological, and emotional costs of trading. I HATE the feeling of constantly checking my phone to check positions when I wake up or before bed. I HATE constantly thinking about my exposure while at the gym or at dinner with friends.
My dad died young and I’m acutely aware of my health and the sacrifices I made to get where I am at such a young age. Trading is NOT healthy. You’re indoors, sedentary, high-stress. It RUINS my sleep. I’ve had a professional team track and confirm that.
My goal is to be happy and live long. Trading doesn't help either of those anymore. Only for big market opportunities am I willing to trade bc I recognize what that money does for others at limited cost to myself.
Plus trading is REALLY hard. Always. It’s an emotional rollercoaster that I don’t want to be on forever. To what end? More money???
Now look, if you are in the trenches, if you are looking to make your nut still... I 100% get it. You SHOULD be sacrificing for success. I don't regret sacrificing my 20s for the freedom it has bought me whatsoever. But my values have changed over time, rightfully so. I'm now here to help you make that trade-off and help you earn your freedom, if it is one you wish to make.
2. “Yea, but why not just trade way smaller?” For the same reason Tom Brady isn’t out there playing rec football. Nobody on earth wants to go from the highest level of their craft to trading in the little league lol.
3. "But you're giving up so much money." Issue is the market will ALWAYS be there. Unlike athletes, aging isn’t gravity in this craft. Just because I can keep doing it, should I really obsessively trade and put myself through this for the rest of my life just because there is MORE money out there? By that logic, shouldn’t every rich person always do their job until infinite? Obviously not.
(FYI - the hardest part of moving on from trading has been ignoring the financial opportunity cost. This gets discussed thoroughly in my Market Wizards chapter. I am blatantly aware that I am giving up huge money over the course of a lifetime. I promise I can do math, know that money compounds, and am not a dumbass.)
4. “Ok, I get why you trade less, but why make a course?”
Look, I didn’t think I’d do this either. Years ago, after leaving @TRLM I started sharing my knowledge on Twitter for kicks. No plan, no vision. To my surprise, the content took off thanks to people like @investorslive.
I spent my whole career at Trillium mentoring and training other traders. And I enjoyed it! I enjoyed seeing others win! Now I could do that at a massive scale.
BUT - all of my content was being done haphazardly. For my more time-intensive content I started a Patreon that donated 100% of proceeds to charity. With minimal effort on my part, we raised $250k+!
AND… the traders LOVED IT! That was the lightbulb moment that I should do this properly.
5. Giving back is genuinely important to me, not just performative. My life philosophy is that we all win when everyone else wins. The world is a better place when we lift each other up.
Before I had much, I started a non-profit @impact_comp in 2018. It has now touched the lives of THOUSANDS of students, THOUSANDS of people in need (mental illness, homeless, cancer patients, children w Down Syndrome, food banks, etc) and my social impact competitions are now at over a dozen colleges across the US!
I truly believe that my content helps cut through much of the scammers out there. It was awful hearing stories of good people wasting years of their life and thousands of dollars on bs. The trading community deserved better.
Same reason why I have been a longtime speaker and Boardmember at @traders4acause. I want to connect traders, educate them, help them find success, and then give back.
It has been amazing to see how many people my knowledge has helped! I’ve had people in rural Wisconsin, a regional airport in Norway, at a racetrack, at a small gym, and all over thank me for what I do. That’s cool!
Don’t wana buy my course? No worries, I have years of content here and on YouTube 100% FREE!
6. “But why charge? Haven’t you made enough money?” Yes, I have. So have many rich people. Why does Brady still get paid? Or Sam Altman? Or Elon Musk? To many it is part of the scorecard, that is one factor. For me, it is more than that.
Most of my wealth will go or has already gone to charity.
That said, how cool would it be to be able to donate $100k/mo NOW AND FOREVER!? That has long been the stated goal of the course. (We are nowhere near that yet. Turns out marketing is quite hard!)
The other issue with not charging - and every single marketer told me this from day one - if you don’t charge, the user doesn’t value the content. I ignored that advice, refused to believe it, and ended up dead wrong. That was my biggest mistake and a part of why we ended the free version of the course and are instead re-purposing it all onto YouTube (YT also increases our reach & removes a sign-up friction).
Our data clearly showed that paid users value the knowledge more and commit to a course far more when they have skin in the game.
7. It turns out, I actually LOVE learning this new business. I’ve been absolutely fascinated learning from Hormozi. To get to learn from a living genius in-person is an incredible experience.
This work is ZERO stress to me. I never have a bad day due to content or marketing. I love thinking up new video ideas. I love seeing what gets clicks and what doesn’t.
Only driven, type-A people get here to begin with. So sue me bc I don’t wana lay by the pool all day?
8. As I’ve immersed myself in the world of content and marketing, I’ve begun to see the matrix. Building my personal brand has so many asymmetric positive effects and possibilities.
How do you think I got into the Market Wizards book or featured on WIRED!? That only happened bc I was public for people to find me.
I’ve been able to converse on this platform with some of my favorite idols. James Clear used a quote I tweeted in his newsletter. I’ve DM’ed with Bryan Johnson. In a month I’m going to Dubai to work with a trading firm. I’ve now worked with a handful of the best traders AND trading firms around the world bc of this platform. All of that is SO COOL TO ME!
I have a vision for what I’m building that is so large nobody would ever believe it. I do think there is a world where in 3-5 years, I become one of the trusted voices in trading and markets. That would be badass!
9. Finally… I’ve made incredible friends from doing this. Yes, big dogs like @theshortbear. Yes, even the crazy characters like @timothysykes. All of them, people like @investorslive, have shaped my life and who I am. But the infinite traders in between. From @RealSimpleAriel, to @jscherniack, to @LikeTheHotel, to @TheStrongTrader, @traderkylec, @thelaptoplegend, my pickleball bro @tradethedownhill in Miami, to even the close friendship with @TradesTurbo crushing steaks across the pond together!
10. There will always be a few haters who doubt my achievements no matter how much proof you put in front of them. That is the GREATEST compliment you can ever give a man! THANK YOU! You are the best free marketing I can ever get 😘
So there ya go… the most comprehensive answer I’ve ever given on why I do this despite all the skepticism around trading courses / content creators.
Now.... let's get the f*ck to work!
Much love,
- (The One) Lance B
visualization is the closest thing we have to a superpower
Trading has a peculiar way of humbling even the most confident, pulling them through a predictable arc that feels anything but predictable when you’re living it. You start with naive simplicity, convinced that a few basic rules and perhaps some indicators will unlock consistent profits. But markets have a brutal way of exposing the gaps in oversimplified strategies, and once you get thoroughly rekt, you inevitably enter an optimization phase driven by the urgent need to “fix” what went wrong. The problem is that most traders dive into this phase without realizing that risk never actually disappears; it just shifts around like water, flowing into different corners of your system depending on which lever you decide to adjust.
This optimization phase becomes a dangerous trap because traders conflate complexity with usefulness, assuming that more sophisticated systems automatically translate to better performance. You start layering on additional data and building increasingly elaborate rules, all while remaining blissfully unaware that each “improvement” is simply redistributing risk rather than eliminating it. The irony is that this journey through complexity, while often painful and expensive, is actually necessary for developing genuine expertise; but only if you eventually recognize that optimization frequently just means making things more complex without making them more effective.
When you finally return to simplicity, it becomes informed simplicity: you understand not just what works, but why certain complexities matter and others don’t, and most importantly, you’ve learned that every adjustment comes with tradeoffs that can’t be optimized away. The full circle is the natural evolution of mastery, where apparent simplicity masks hard-won wisdom about what truly matters and what’s just noise.
Somewhat surprised at my feed and how many got surprised by the markets today.
To me it looks like most got caught either over the weekend into the feared 'black Monday' or through the subsequent fail to capitalize in the fake headline.
Latest the next day on the biggest intraday reversal, 90% of players got wiped out. With VIX this high, volatility has to be expected. There seems to be a true disconnect between range and sizing and loss of perspective. Most are likely oversizing trying so hard to have a big position for the potential bottom.
Yesterday, despite the 90 days pause, does not offer us much clarity about the likelihood of deals truly closing and more importantly, the most important counterparty and trade partner is still under pressure from the US and being bullied into an attempt at a deal.
The market is a master at letting noone in into market bottoms. By design it creates the most amount of liquidity for the smallest amount of players and will make sure you can't simply add to positions and enjoy a smooth ride higher.
Most are sizing in for scenario A, while it does not reflect reality.
The reality needs to account for excess, meaning the lack of liquidity and emotions involved in the search for stability and in order to climb the wall of worry.
The best way to truly see if we are making progress is by zooming out your timeframe. A breakdown and reclaim on a 5min or 30min chart might look like a wick and hold on an hourly or daily chart. The higher the VIX/Volatility and the higher the uncertainty, the more likely the excess are to happen.
A second trick to avoid oversizing and getting lost in the volatility is to risk off of prior lows rather than a support hold while entering near support.
A third approach is to only get involved in the excess while risking prior structure. You're message in this case being that we have seen peak panic and you want to play off of the remaining uncertainty and emotionality, while risking a trend change. In essence you play against the break of a higher high and higher low trend.
In this case missing the trend is possible, but this aspect is mitigated through its higher RR.
Finally and most importantly, you have to figure out a way to be able to stomach a full reversal and further unwind until the eventual bottom. If you keep getting wicked out and panic, only to end up holding the last position into new lows and panicking out... you truly lost.
The mission is to either be very long term and owning businesses at a great valuation or it needs to be an effective way to participate safely in what is without a doubt the hardest part of a trend, the initial formation of a bottom and beginning of a trend.
The days of unlimited QE and V-bottoms are gone, we are still under QT and making aspects are very uncertain. Most are trading the past and their emotions right now.
6 months of struggling followed by 6 months of winning. Blessed to achieve these numbers in the last two quarters after trying to get back in sync with the markets in Q1 and Q2. Patience pays!
2024 was by far my most successful year, while at the same time finishing #1 on @Bybit_Official . 🙏
Trigger warning: long post
I traded perps well during the 7 month chop and put all profit into spot BTC. Throughout this whole year and previous years I tried to learn more about the macro, political and regulatory landscape for crypto. As the election drew closer and Trump started positioning himself as the pro crypto president, I became increasingly confident that the election was monumentally important for the price and future of our coins. I believed the election outcome was binary, Kamala wins prices down bad and Trump wins prices up huge. So I tried to learn as much as possible about the US election, polling, betting markets etc.
It seemed to me betting markets were far more reliable and polling was consistently unreliable and had a bias skewed against Trump historically. As the betting markets like Polymarket favoured Trump 60/40 and the polls were 50/50, I decided the goal was to try be as long as much BTC as possible in the event of a Trump win. I did not believe the FUD that Polymarket was unreliable or biased, billions of $ were being wagered and smart players would bet Kamala back to 50/50 if those were the true odds as the polls said. The trump trades in the stock and bond markets also reflected that billions were being wagered on a Trump win. Tech CEO's with vast data sets like Zuckerburg and Bezos both started slow pivots away from Kamala towards Trump.
On Saturday 2nd November I was given a gift by the markets, the Ann Selzer poll was released. She is considered one of the best pollsters in the country and her poll had Kamala winning by a huge margin. On seeing the poll I saw that Polymarket immediately knee-jerk pumped Kamala's odds by 10% or so and yet confusingly, crypto was flat. I shorted ETH (my preferred liquid short for majority of the year) on seeing this and it took a few hours before panic set in and crypto prices dumped. Unfortunately for the ETFs they had to wait until Monday to sell and on Monday they capitulated hard. They were panic dumping into the US close on Monday and seeing as I do not much weight in the polls at all (only believe that others mistakenly do) I closed my ETH short and started longing BTC from the low 67k's ETF capitulation. From there prices rallied to around $69k+ which put my BTC long in a nice comfortable profit heading into election day.
A friend I had met through crypto offered to let me into his voice call group of pro election betters and analysts on election day. These guys knew the importance of every single voter demographic in each county in each state. As the early votes and demographic data came in the group were shocked at how bullish all the early data was swinging towards Trump and the Polymarket odds started climbing slowly as more data came in. I increased the size of my long as both Polymarket odds increased and the election betting group became more and more confident. As my entry started from the Ann Selzer dip I had quite a bit of buffer giving me confidence that if things turned sour and Kamala won I would be able to exit either in tiny profit or a manageable loss. In the end my spot portfolio was 100% allocated to BTC and my perp position was 1.5x the size of that on top from around $70-71k average, the most levered long position I have ever taken in $ terms. Polymarket was around 72% Trump by the time I was fully sized. I did not take any profit until $90k+ and have since re-longed BTC many times in smaller size with latest exit around $106k.
The path to excellence is an elegant dance with pain.
There are whole books on psychology that don't get anywhere near this paragraph from Dostoevsky
https://t.co/lVotnb253G
Remember that you will rise to the level of your systems, not the wants of your goals.
I thought we would take some time to dissect the newest turtle podcast.
@TheOneLanceB and Jonathan talk are full of small gems.
If you are anywhere during your learning journey, this should be non-negotiable material.
https://t.co/5cmEnzElQY
While the production costs as a price floor make sense to me, I'm less confident about modeling an upper price limit. #bitcoin
However, it’s interesting to note that the range between the levels shown here has been converging toward a "stable" value over the past few years. 1/2
I listened to the @MoistMango12 interview with IU which had a profound impact on me.
The headline is his huge $1.6m chop in $NVDA.
But going deeper, here is one of the best traders on social detailing his experiences with drawdowns.
This resonated. Here is what I learned:
Discipline today is freedom tomorrow
An email from Coach Sommer I revisit often:
Hi Tim,
Patience. Far too soon to expect strength improvements. Strength improvements [for a movement like this] take a minimum of 6 weeks. Any perceived improvements prior to that are simply the result of improved synaptic facilitation. In plain English, the central nervous system simply became more efficient at that particular movement with practice. This is, however, not to be confused with actual strength gains.
Dealing with the temporary frustration of not making progress is an integral part of the path towards excellence. In fact, it is essential and something that every single elite athlete has had to learn to deal with. If the pursuit of excellence was easy, everyone would do it.
In fact, this impatience in dealing with frustration is the primary reason that most people fail to achieve their goals. Unreasonable expectations timewise, resulting in unnecessary frustration, due to a perceived feeling of failure. Achieving the extraordinary is not a linear process.
The secret is to show up, do the work, and go home.
A blue collar work ethic married to indomitable will. It is literally that simple. Nothing interferes. Nothing can sway you from your purpose. Once the decision is made, simply refuse to budge. Refuse to compromise.
And accept that quality long-term results require quality long-term focus. No emotion. No drama. No beating yourself up over small bumps in the road. Learn to enjoy and appreciate the process. This is especially important because you are going to spend far more time on the actual journey than with those all too brief moments of triumph at the end.
Certainly celebrate the moments of triumph when they occur. More importantly, learn from defeats when they happen. In fact, if you are not encountering defeat on a fairly regular basis, you are not trying hard enough. And absolutely refuse to accept less than your best.
Throw out a timeline. It will take what it takes.
If the commitment is to a long-term goal and not to a series of smaller intermediate goals, then only one decision needs to be made and adhered to. Clear, simple, straightforward. Much easier to maintain than having to make small decision after small decision to stay the course when dealing with each step along the way. This provides far too many opportunities to inadvertently drift from your chosen goal. The single decision is one of the most powerful tools in the toolbox.
Nietzsche can hype you up
With a potential $ETH ETF approval, animal spirits could be coming back quickly into crypto markets.
Maybe it’s time to rewire your brain for a proper bull run alt season…
I bet you will love this thread about some of the insanity we saw in 2021 :
(1/n) 🧵
someday the classical rules of crypto mechanics will be codified into a principia bitphysics
at this point they will stop working and only gigabrain quantum crypto mechanics will be winners
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