Economy
The Utopian Vision of normative economists (of the kind to ask you to make rational choices because that is what is deemed good for you), etc. They believe in reason and rationality—that we should overcome cultural impediments on our way to becoming a better human race—thinking we can control our nature at will and transform it by mere edict in order to attain, among other things, happiness and rationality. Basically this category would include those who think that the cure for obesity is to inform people that they should be healthy.
Hedge Funds and their modus operandi
| Firm | Who They Are | What They Do | What They're Trading |
|---|---|---|---|
| Citadel Securities | Ken Griffin’s personal joystick | Every asset class, every horizon, every universe | Trading TSLA using a 17-layer transformer trained on Robinhood order flow vibes |
| Jane Street | Accidentally invented markets | Literally everything simultaneously | Buying an ETF, hedging it, creating it, redeeming it, and explaining it to the exchange |
| Jump Trading | FPGA enjoyers anonymous | Speed. Just speed. No idea what they’re trading | Clicking faster than light on S&P futures because CME latency felt disrespectful |
| HRT | Math PhDs who discovered GPUs | ML. More ML. Even when it makes no sense | Market making TSLA using a model that also predicts movie box office revenue |
| SIG | Options traders who won’t shut up about Greeks | Semi-systematic vibes-based vol trading | Selling TSLA vol because it “feels rich” (backed by a 400-page internal memo) |
| Five Rings | Jane Street but quieter | Classified. Even internally | Trading ??? using ??? on ??? with ??? |
| Tower Research | Colocation maximalists | Latency arbitrage that stopped working in 2014 | Racing someone else to trade the same Eurex future for 0.01 ticks |
| Optiver | Dutch guys who discovered options | Being paid to exist inside SPX | Quoting SPX options so wide it’s technically modern art |
| IMC | Optiver but louder | European options HFT | Losing money on US equities while dominating Dutch pension flows |
| XTX Markets | “Systematic” but make it British | FX, equities, crypto, your mom | Trading gold because an RL agent decided inflation is “a narrative” |
| Headlands | Commodity bros with Python | Niche futures nobody remembers exist | Market making coffee futures despite never drinking coffee |
| DRW | Chicago options legends | Everything with implied volatility | Buying Treasury options because rates “might do something” |
