How to find your arbitrage (from the guy who’s done it 3x)
Shaan Puri talks with Nick Kokonas, who went from options trader to co-founder of Alinea to selling Tock, about finding arbitrage, chasing useful discomfort, and borrowing ideas from magic and theater.
The gist
-
Kokonas says every arbitrage comes down to time scale, like his direct New York to Chicago line, which made over 100 million in a year.
-
He built buzz for Alinea by open sourcing its whole business plan on eGullet, drawing hundreds of thousands of views before opening.
-
Alinea's service was modeled on Stop Making Sense, starting with an empty table and building up to callbacks later in the meal.
-
He trained waiters with Derren Brown videos, teaching them to stand beside diners rather than across from them to build trust.
-
With magician Nate Staniforth, author of Finding Real Magic, he is planning Strange House, a 90,000 square foot illusion experience under Wall Street.
"There's this book called Market Wizards. It's one of the rare trading books that's great. Now everything in it's out of date in terms of the process of the floor traders, but what's not out of date with the Market Wizards book is the mentality of the people that he profiles in..."
▶ Play at 1:39:53"Stop everything. Really? Are you kidding? ... So the great thing about Stop Making Sense, that concert, was that David Byrne walks out. No one else is on stage. He has a boom box... and then the stage builds... as the world around him gets bigger, he gets literally smaller by ..."
▶ Play at 1:05:01"He sent me a book he wrote called Finding Real Magic. He went to India, and I read it after... unbelievable book."
▶ Play at 1:50:05What they recommend · 4 picks
"Stop everything. Really? Are you kidding? ... So the great thing about Stop Making Sense, that concert, was that David Byrne walks out. No one else is on stage. He has a boom bo..."
"There's this book called Market Wizards. It's one of the rare trading books that's great. Now everything in it's out of date in terms of the process of the floor traders, but wh..."
"One of my favorite documentaries of all time that I literally watch once a year is Hearts of Darkness. It's the making of Apocalypse Now. You want to talk about fear? Every time..."
My First Million, Riley, Peter and Liam agree on 30 things
See what they all use, in their own words. Paid ads are left out.
See what they all swear by Or pick your own peopleAlso mentioned
Ads in this episode
HubSpot. They're paid, so we keep them out of the picks above.
See what My First Million recommends without being paid →Related episodes
Episodes covering similar topics
More from My First Million