(Note: Biff has been a tireless chronicler of the affairs of Slopedom.
I wanted to turn the table and interview him for Slopers.)
Leisa:
Biff, I still remember very vividly your entrée into the SOH. I found
you to be a very fresh and interesting voice–I have to say, too, that
your moniker, Biffermas, had a certain odd crispness to both my eye and
ear. I'd like to start by asking you how you found SOH.
Biff: I merely stumbled
upon it while doing a Google search of some financial thing or another.
It immediately struck me as something unique given the large community
that actively participated in the forum. Until then my only exposure to
trading forums was through Yahoo Finance, which is inhabited by various
trolls, stock pumpers, and generally unpleasant people from the
internet underground. Slopers were respectful, intelligent, and
committed to the site. Weird!
In the community trading blog
genre there are many excellent sites, but most are focused primarily on
the exchange of trading ideas. This is valuable, but I find such
interaction kind of dry after awhile. Besides, I have a trading plan
and style, so I'm not looking for "hot tips" and new ideas. I like the
waffle house / neighborhood bar feel of the Slope, where random
conversation occurs alongside trading topics.This seems kind of dry, but
I don't know quite how to make it interesting.
Leisa: What aspects of your
personal life would you like to share with Slopers?
Biff: This is a tough one
to answer, since personal life stories can be quite boring. I was born
in Utah in 1970, and spent my early childhood in Northern California
while my dad suffered through a medical residency in Santa Rosa. My
parents divorced when I was seven and I moved back to Utah with my
mother. I was raised Mormon in various backwater locations until I
declared war on authority at 14. Ironically I received my Eagle Scout
award just prior to this phase!
During my teenage years I exerted full
independence from mankind and made all kinds of bad decisions, which
took years and needless stress to recover from (I won’t go into details,
here). Being a young fool I joined the Army Reserves at 17, and went
to basic training upon graduation from high school. College was a much
needed clean slate and I capitalized on this by playing the academic
game as well as possible.
During this time I married Mrs. Biff at a fairly young age (22), and she
gave birth to little Biff five months later. We’ve had a great life,
the three of us. After finishing at the University of Utah we moved to
Milwaukee for dental school at Marquette University. Four years later I
graduated and was accepted to the orthodontic residency, which took
another two years. We moved to Colorado, bought one practice and opened
another, and we found ourselves in our early thirties with well over a
million dollars in debt (since paid off). I should note that Mrs. Biff
is a pediatric dentist, and we share a practice together. 
I’ve
had many hobbies, which I consider to represent on of life’s great
pleasures. Among my favorites are: brewing beer, distilling hard
liquor, making wine, hydroponic gardening, construction / wood working
(I built the trading room / tiki shack shown in the picture, below), skiing,
mountain climbing. I even went through a brief quilting phase, which
I’ve been mocked for incessantly!
Leisa: I've enclosed a picture of your wine room. Is that
one of your quilts on the floor?
Biff: The quilt shown is something we
purchased at a
charity auction. Boulder Dental Aid holds an annual fund raiser that we
support. The money keeps a practice for low-income children
functioning.
Leisa: I'm quite fond of the FatBoy Slim Weapon of
Choice video that you introduced to the Slope. With respect to
trading, what would you describe as your Weapon of Choice? Are you a
futures, ETF, single equities guy, or a Renaissance man? Also, what
time frame (short, intermediate, or long term) time frame do you use?
Biff : With any new profession or serious endeavor it’s
important to initially expand your knowledge base and be open to a huge
spectrum of ideas and styles. Many assorted professions (including my
field of orthodontics) follow this philosophy. What ultimately happens
to any effective professional is they submerge the vast majority of what
they’ve learned and focus on a single, predictable technique that works
for them. This often takes years of practice to achieve, and some
never quite arrive. The most dangerous surgeons are those that never
settled on a coherent, reproducible style for any given procedure they
perform. Having a patient on life support and splayed open is no time
for contemplation and second-guessing oneself (insert your own trading
analogy here…)
Following
this process I very effectively formed a tremendous cloud of trading
information which led to my “paralysis by analysis” phase. This lasted
many years, and I’m still shedding needless “baggage”. I eliminate
concepts and ideas that don’t suit my purposes in a very Darwinian way.
Through my experience trading I’ve tried countless methods for various
lengths of time, but ultimately always returned to what suits my perso
nality:
day-trading with futures. I’m not altogether comfortable in what that
says about me, quite frankly!
My trading knowledge came from
persistent personal study, but my trading style is assembled largely
from what I learned here on the Slope from people like you, Market
Sniper, Giledain, ComicFX, Viscous, and many others. The willingness of
our friendly community to share and help others out is quite
remarkable.
Leisa: We know that with most of things that we
undertake in life, those that challenge us help us develop needed
skills. However, those challenges also unearth some weaknesses. Would
you be willing to share with Slopers your single greatest strength and
how you've developed that in addition to your single biggest weakness
and how you have compensated for that?
Biff: Ironically my twin strengths
also periodically become my twin weaknesses. They are, 1- my
obsessive-compulsive focus / stubbornness, and 2- my comfort level with
risk taking.
If
compelled, I can tackle a single subject or problem for 18 hours a day
and months / years on end. I refuse to give up until the issue is
solved to my satisfaction. Naturally this becomes a net liability at
times as well, since virtually every other aspect of my life falls
dramatically on my priority list. Trading is unique because it's been
my major extra curricular passion since 2002, far longer than any other
obsession has retained such a lofty status. My comfort with taking a
risk has been a huge benefit in my life in general. I've never minded
moving to a new city, opening a business, taking on debt, initiating a
trade, going to school for protracted periods with no income,
etc. Occasionally this risk-taking backfires. I’m ashamed to admit I
purchased my house in May 2007. Talk about lousy timing! My penchant
for risk taking has also caused some hardships in a few areas. Starting a
practice from scratch resulted in zero income for two years, and I blew
out my trading account as a noob in 2002. Overall, however, one must
take a chance or remain stagnant in life.
Leisa: If you had only one minute to spend with an aspiring,
avocational trader, what would you want to say to that person?
Biff: Focus on defense. This game
might appear easy, but it isn't. You will come face to face with the
darkest aspects of your personality. There are some basics that you
should follow until you become comfortable with your own trading
psychology and methods. If you find yourself violating these, you
should seriously question whether you have the makeup for trading,
because you are heading for disaster.
- Have a reasonable
stop for every position you place. Allow your stops to be hit without
flinching.
- Don't use excessive leverage, and don't attempt to
hit home runs.
- You are a student, and you must be willing to
spend the time to learn.
- Avoid “gurus.” Have faith in
yourself.
- Eliminate the risk in any trade early by taking
partial profits and raising your stops.
Leisa: You trading room looks very
inviting! Biff, thanks for taking the time to share a few things with
Slopers. There is a reason why I call you Bifferific!
