TTU39: President of Famous CTA Firm Tells All ft. Mike Harris of Campbell & Company – 1of2

This episode goes in-depth into the history of one of the most well-known managed futures firms in the world, Campbell & Company. We explore the beginnings of the company, how they have dealt with challenges a long the way and how they have succeeded to overcome them, as well as the current state of the company and the systematic models their products are built on. Our guest is current President of the company, Mike Harris, and you’ll hear about how he entered the industry as well as his path to becoming Campbell’s President.

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In This Episode, You’ll Learn:

• How Mike explains what he does.
• How his grandfather gave him money to invest in his first stock as a child.
• How his interest in the financial markets started young and how he structured his whole education around working in this industry.
• About his first job out of college.
• About his time as a Futures Broker.
• How he joined Campbell & Company in 2000, starting at the European Trading desk.
• How he came to be President.
• The story of how Keith Campbell started the firm in 1972.
• The history of Campbell & Company.
• How they dealt with drawdowns in 1994 and ’95.
• Why Mike has always been an avid reader.
• How Campbell’s 2nd President, Bruce Cleland ran the business for 20 years and how I met him back in 1993.
• What the company’s product offering looks like today.
• How the company’s 130+ employees are organised.
• How they outsource things on the technology side of the business.
• What he looks for when adding staff to his research team.
• How Mike builds a strong company culture.
• How investors should make sense of the track record of Campbell & Co since they have such a long history.
• Changes they have made to the trading models after 2007 and 2008.
• The ways the company uses long term, medium term, and shorter term systems.
• Where the company wants to grow and how big it wants to get.

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Resources & Links Mentioned in this Episode:

• Learn about a Carry Trades.
• Learn more about short-term mean reversion.

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