Here at 3go1go headquarters things have been very slow. The sales force has been unable to make their monthly expected revenue number because buy side accounts are not trading any bonds due to lack of volatility and lack of trading ideas. So what have the big brains in management decided to do? The only thing that makes sense to them, hire more 3go1go monkeys. Also known as rearranging the deck chairs on the titanic. When new monkeys start the old monkeys lose accounts. Obviously not a good thing for a few different reasons. Why you may ask? How can it be a bad thing when an experienced finance professional that is an expert on hitting 4 keys on a specialized keyboard not be a good thing. Well first of all new guy is taking money out of my pocket. Try explaining that one to the wife. Me, “Hey honey, I had a horrible quarter and could barely pay the mortgage but it should get better. We hired another guy to to do the exact same thing I have been doing for the past year and we expect a different result.” Maybe just maybe he will get a response to the endless Bloomberg messages we send out and maybe his don’t go into the black hole like mine do.
So you go to the boss and say “I have no problem giving up some of my accounts to the new guy but what have the accounts said about him? He says well I have reached out to the pm’s and traders and they all say he is a nice guy. That’s great but the desk is full of nice guys. Any chance we can get an asshole that would bring in a whole lot of business and I may one day have a chance of actually retiring. Well Ralph, you know we have a no asshole policy at this firm. So we hire the nice guy to go along with the 15 other nice guys we already have on the desk. So new monkey comes in gets a great account package and all is well with the world. Fits right in. Hasn’t used the phone once and can 3go1go with the best of them. He’s been here for a month and finally did his first trade. Ain’t that a kick in the nutz.