The Trading Game

A Confession

By: Gary Stevenson

Narrated by: Gary Stevenson

#1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER • “The Best Wall Street Book of 2024”—Bloomberg

A “vivid” (Financial Times) rags-to-riches memoir that takes listeners inside the high-stakes drama and hubris of the trading floor, a “darkly funny” (Guardian) tale of Citibank’s one-time most profitable trader, and why he gave it all up

“Darker than [Liar’s Poker], but if anything even more of a rollicking read . . . the clearest account I've ever read of how trading desks really work.”—Felix Salmon, Axios

In development as a limited series

• Longlisted for the FT and Schroders Business Book of the Year

If you were gonna rob a bank and you saw the vault door there, left open, what would you do? Would you wait around?

Ever since he was a kid, kicking broken soccer balls on the run-down streets of East London, Gary Stevenson dreamed of something bigger. As luck would have it, he was good at numbers.

At the London School of Economics, wearing tracksuits and sneakers, Stevenson shocked his posh classmates by winning a competition called “The Trading Game.” The prize? A golden ticket to a new life, as the youngest trader at Citibank. A place where you could make more money than you’d ever imagined. Where your colleagues are dysfunctional geniuses and insecure bullies yet start to feel like family. Where against the odds you become the bank’s most profitable trader, closing deals worth nearly a trillion dollars. A day.

Soon you are dreaming of numbers in your sleep—and then you stop sleeping at all. But what happens when winning starts to feel like losing? You’re making a killing betting on millions of people becoming poorer—like the very people you grew up with. The economy is slipping off a precipice, and your own sanity starts slipping with it. You want to stop, but you can’t. Because nobody ever leaves.

Would you stick, or quit? Even if it meant risking everything?

The Trading Game is an outrageous, unvarnished, white-knuckle journey to the dark heart of an intoxicating world—the trading floor—from someone who survived the game and then blew it all wide open.

©2024 Gary Stevenson (P)2024 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“Hilarious, shocking and deeply sad—often in the same sentence.”—The Times

“A well written and often darkly funny book that makes a convincing case that high finance is as toxic, reckless and deeply cynical as ever.”—The Guardian

“Stevenson is a fine wordsmith. . . . His portrayal as an unlikely hero, brimming with wit and a low tolerance for nonsense, makes for an engaging read.”—Turney Duff, The Telegraph

a trader with a conscience

I came across Gary 's YouTube channel because I watch a lot of videos from leftist economists. He seemed to be one of the few that really knew and understood what he was talking about as well as someone with valid critiques of the field of economics, the same critiques that I had been forming in my mind as well. When I heard a little of his story I absolutely had to give his book a read because how he ended up where he is, and where he was is truly remarkable and he does an excellent job telling it. He's very humorous and very insightful. He made me want to go to Japan just to experience the food that he talked about at great length. At the same time, it's a very sad story about how he achieved what many in his exact same position would only dream of only for it to drive him mad as well as the very sour forecast he has for the global economy, which I agree is doomed if we let it continue on like this. This has been one of the best books I've read all year. I'd recommend it to anyone but especially people with a little interest in economics and who care about inequality and want to do something to fix it

Fascinating Story

I found this story to be important, well written and very well performed. I’ll listen again. Maybe enough of us will do something Gary.

Very enjoyable book

Great reading, good story and thoughtful way of explaining his view from the world he lived

Excellent!

Good enough that I didn't want it to end! You won't learn much about trading (though maybe it points to the most important things), but this personal story from someone who was mostly a market maker is engrossing and a very enjoyable listen. Very much worth your time.

Great storytelling

Loved the commitment of Gary to change the world. I strongly recommend it. Everything comes at a cost.

A compelling story

The book grabs you and keeps you there with the personal style of a complicated world in trading.
You feel the author/reader of the story, like you're in a private conversation with him telling his story.

Unique narrative

This way the most complete and detailed narrative from inside a trading floor. Probably this will have similar impact as Liars Poker, I mean, the opposite the author’s intention.
Indeed many things Gary tells still holds in these environments, and its purpose still split opinions. The truth is, it is what it is and probably will not change in foreseeable future.
Fluid and page turning.

Good Story

First book in over a decade that I actually finished. This guy gets it.

If you want to know the health of the economy, don't look at the stock market—go outside and open your eyes.

An Interesting personal history by an enormously talented and successful FX trader.

An interesting and well read tale about an enormously talented FX trader who ended up battling his employer and winning. That said it was too long for my taste. It could have used some additional editing to eliminate parts that weren’t integral to the story of the author’s career as a trader.

Great story telling

What happened to wizard ????? Why, just why? Great book. Hope there is part II when he comes back to the game