Happy Year of the Ox ! Have Fun Staying Rich !

OK, I'm taking a short break these few days and will refrain from doing any actual work so this is a good time to provide a personal update.

a) Business Update

I'm grateful that at least I still have a class to conduct next week. 

Beyond just being a trainer, I'm finally getting closer to taking the next step to expanding my business offerings. I currently have a great partnership with Dr Wealth, Stocks Cafe and Pyinvesting. I hope to introduce a fourth partner into the mix that runs a different model from the others. 

It has taken me far too long to get into this new line of business. I blame myself for my risk-averse nature but I think this time I can get around the obstacles and create a credible offering for potential clients. 

b) Coding work - Now getting into neural networks

Right now I am going through the painful process of using Keras to build neural networks for making trading decisions and I can't present my findings because I can only create an artificial intelligence to lose a fair bit of money in the financial markets. Lucky I only do paper trading at the moment. 

It takes a lot of effort to figure out the best arrangement of neurons to create an electronic trader and I'm still limited to price and technical information. The finance domain has no advice on the proper activation models to employ for my neural networks. Why sigmoid function instead of ReLu? Why 32 perceptrons is better than 64? How many layers to construct?

Right now I feel that I won't figure it out even if I spend the rest of my life doing this.

Imagine what happens when I have to do quantum computing to solve financial problems. Maybe a Phd would be inevitable then.

c) Books I am reading

I've got a few major reads, one is a huge volume on the history of China from the Qing Dynasty to the present day. But the book I am tackling right now is Expected Returns by Antti Ilmanen. This is rapidly becoming required reading for quants everywhere although its findings are challenged by the strengths of the growth factor in the markets right now. 

Also, there are just too many fictional works on my KIV list from the third book in the Black Company, the second and third book in the Dune series and the last Legend of the Condor English translation will be coming out next month. 

d) Leisure and Hobbies

There is some decent progress on this front. I play a D&D game as a player. I may also run a regular D&D game for a group of Millenials/Gen Z as a DM. I even play Baldur's Gate 3 but the game is not even fully developed yet. 

Like many readers, I can't wait to subscribe to Disney+ so I can get into Falcon and the Winter Soldier. I suspect Marvel will now evolve into a string of series to continue the storyline after Avengers Endgame. 

I guess the question is whether I should cancel my Netflix account after I go to Disney+.

e) Health

CNY is wreaking havoc on my diet. I hope to get vaccinated ASAP so that I can get back to the gym with my personal trainer. 

I think that 2021 is shaping out rather well, my guess is that even value investors should get something this year.