"All of sports betting, all of playing poker, and all of options trading is making sure you're betting against someone you're smarter than."
The philosophy that Philadelphia-area trader Jeff Yass outlined a year ago in an episode of the Bet The Process podcast is one that has yielded him billions of dollars in riches over his 63 years on earth.
Yass chairs the Susquehanna International Group, which traded 1.8 billion stock options contracts last year. He co-founded the firm — building it from the ground up — with money he earned as an avid horseplayer and poker player in the 1970s and 1980s, as recently chronicled by Forbes.
His knack for finding edges and spotting overlays — namely in his onslaught of a jackpot wager offered at the now-defunct Sportsman's Park in Chicago in 1985 — translated beautifully to the stock market. Through time, Yass' purely analytical approach to trading and use of program trading techniques was a catalyst for significant adaptation in how stocks are traded.
To read the entire Forbes feature on Yass, click the following link: How Trader Jeff Yass Parlayed Poker and Horse Race Handicapping into a $12 Billion Fortune.