Callum Makkai
@callum-makkai.bsky.social
Quantitative trader focused on small cap equities
“things that have positive skew may not have as good a Sharpe ratio, but may produce you a better geometric return. Things that have negative skew produce the opposite effect.”
#trading
#trading
November 22, 2025 at 11:19 PM
“things that have positive skew may not have as good a Sharpe ratio, but may produce you a better geometric return. Things that have negative skew produce the opposite effect.”
#trading
#trading
“Markets are not arbitrage mechanisms. That’s sometimes misunderstood. They’re voting mechanisms. The price is a weighted average vote where the weight is by dollars.”
#markets
#markets
November 13, 2025 at 10:07 PM
“Markets are not arbitrage mechanisms. That’s sometimes misunderstood. They’re voting mechanisms. The price is a weighted average vote where the weight is by dollars.”
#markets
#markets
"When you have these cycles, things can run for a period of time. But there are things that will change sentiment and will create drawdowns, or change the perspective on the growth trajectory, and none of us are smart enough to see them until they actually occur." — DJ Sol
#markets
#markets
November 4, 2025 at 5:55 PM
"When you have these cycles, things can run for a period of time. But there are things that will change sentiment and will create drawdowns, or change the perspective on the growth trajectory, and none of us are smart enough to see them until they actually occur." — DJ Sol
#markets
#markets
“how people handle drawdowns, I think, it makes some of the biggest difference in who is successful over the long run. As during a drawdown, your psychology really affects what you're doing.” #trading #markets
David Druz recounts some memorable stories about trading with Ed Seykota.
David Druz recounts some memorable stories about trading with Ed Seykota.
November 3, 2025 at 4:34 AM
“markets are fractal over a wide range. If you get too short or you get too long, the fractal nature of markets breaks down. And of course, fractal is self-similar at different scales… And so we tested it … And suddenly got it to work … so we did trade different timeframes with the same pattern”
October 30, 2025 at 5:35 AM
“markets are fractal over a wide range. If you get too short or you get too long, the fractal nature of markets breaks down. And of course, fractal is self-similar at different scales… And so we tested it … And suddenly got it to work … so we did trade different timeframes with the same pattern”
“In my mind of the three things, timing, money management, portfolio, the portfolio is an order of magnitude at least ten times more important than either of the other two.”
#trading
#trading
October 30, 2025 at 5:25 AM
“In my mind of the three things, timing, money management, portfolio, the portfolio is an order of magnitude at least ten times more important than either of the other two.”
#trading
#trading
“if you're taking risk from the hedgers to make money over the long run, you're going to have a risky or a volatile equity stream … because I'm taking what the hedgers don't want … they're going to pay me to take it. So I have to be able to take it.”
#trading #risk #markets
#trading #risk #markets
October 30, 2025 at 4:37 AM
“in a system of trading, there are three main aspects. There's timing, there's money management, and there's portfolio selection. And all of those have to go into the pie that you're making.”
#trading
#trading
October 30, 2025 at 4:28 AM
“in a system of trading, there are three main aspects. There's timing, there's money management, and there's portfolio selection. And all of those have to go into the pie that you're making.”
#trading
#trading
October 28, 2025 at 5:57 AM
“there's a lot of interest in this business of precision, and I think that is a big mistake. This is not a precision business. This is an accuracy business.”
#trading #investing #markets
#trading #investing #markets
October 25, 2025 at 1:25 AM
“there's a lot of interest in this business of precision, and I think that is a big mistake. This is not a precision business. This is an accuracy business.”
#trading #investing #markets
#trading #investing #markets
“the real arbitrage in the market today is the ability to buy insurance, not through options, but in Delta 1 markets, trading short-term breakouts when the volatility measures are not aligned. So ATRs versus standard deviation, or …”
October 20, 2025 at 4:30 AM
“the real arbitrage in the market today is the ability to buy insurance, not through options, but in Delta 1 markets, trading short-term breakouts when the volatility measures are not aligned. So ATRs versus standard deviation, or …”
“the stock which is making 5 percent a day is a much more riskier stock than a 1 percent stock … you can actually be long insurance and benefit from the tails by trading short-term breakouts in places where the different measures of risk are pointing in different directions.”
October 19, 2025 at 11:24 PM
“the stock which is making 5 percent a day is a much more riskier stock than a 1 percent stock … you can actually be long insurance and benefit from the tails by trading short-term breakouts in places where the different measures of risk are pointing in different directions.”
“stocks bottom on bad news. So if you use bad news to get out, when are you going to get back in?”
#stocks #investing #markets
#stocks #investing #markets
October 9, 2025 at 3:56 AM
“stocks bottom on bad news. So if you use bad news to get out, when are you going to get back in?”
#stocks #investing #markets
#stocks #investing #markets
“Risk and time are opposite sides of the same coin, for if there were no tomorrow there would be no risk. Time transforms risk, and the nature of risk is shaped by the time horizon: the future is the playing field.” — Bernstein, Against The Gods (15)
October 8, 2025 at 6:36 PM
“Risk and time are opposite sides of the same coin, for if there were no tomorrow there would be no risk. Time transforms risk, and the nature of risk is shaped by the time horizon: the future is the playing field.” — Bernstein, Against The Gods (15)
October 6, 2025 at 12:58 AM
Our prosperity depends on people we don’t agree with doing lawful things we don’t like. #economics
October 6, 2025 at 12:45 AM
Our prosperity depends on people we don’t agree with doing lawful things we don’t like. #economics
“My ex-boss was smart enough to actually generate yield in other ways that kept him in the trade. Right. That's the key part … you need to generate income elsewhere to keep you in your hedge or your short. Otherwise, you're screwed.”
#trading #shortselling
#trading #shortselling
October 6, 2025 at 12:11 AM
“My ex-boss was smart enough to actually generate yield in other ways that kept him in the trade. Right. That's the key part … you need to generate income elsewhere to keep you in your hedge or your short. Otherwise, you're screwed.”
#trading #shortselling
#trading #shortselling
“Handicapping is not a test of a man’s ability to apply the right formula to the right situation. It is a test of his creative intelligence.” — Beyer, Picking Winners (191)
October 3, 2025 at 9:21 PM
“Handicapping is not a test of a man’s ability to apply the right formula to the right situation. It is a test of his creative intelligence.” — Beyer, Picking Winners (191)
“When a horseplayer has developed a workable method of handicapping and adopted a rational system of money management, he may hope that he will now be able to live without the drastic, unsettling rises and falls of fortune that most gamblers must endure. But he won’t.”
October 2, 2025 at 7:11 PM
“When a horseplayer has developed a workable method of handicapping and adopted a rational system of money management, he may hope that he will now be able to live without the drastic, unsettling rises and falls of fortune that most gamblers must endure. But he won’t.”
“Even when a man has mastered the art of handicapping, he has not learned how to beat the races. Money management is, with no exaggeration, 50 percent of the game.”
— Beyer, Picking Winners (173)
— Beyer, Picking Winners (173)
October 2, 2025 at 6:31 PM
“Even when a man has mastered the art of handicapping, he has not learned how to beat the races. Money management is, with no exaggeration, 50 percent of the game.”
— Beyer, Picking Winners (173)
— Beyer, Picking Winners (173)