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Laura Pederson

Laura Pedersen was eighteen years old when she was hired for an entry-level job on the trading floor of the American Stock Exchange. Within a year, she was a full-fledged options trader, and at twenty she became the youngest person in history ever to get a seat. At twenty-one, she became a partner in a Wall Street firm, and by twenty-two she was a millionaire (all while taking night classes to earn a Finance degree at New York University). Being an options trader in the explosive financial markets of the 1980s gave Pedersen, a native of Buffalo, New York, a unique opportunity not just to observe, but also to participate in the biggest bull market in history. No peripheral player, she would, during a typical trading day, buy and sell over a million dollars worth of securities. To do so, she engaged in virtual combat, emerging each day from the pit with torn and food-stained clothes, cuts, and bruises, barely able to speak after shouting all day long, and deafened by the roar of the trading floor. Even so, it wasn't all work and no play. In her book Play Money: My Brief But Brilliant Career on Wall Street (1991), Pedersen offers the investing public a wry and candid look at the way Wall Street really works, as seen from inside the world of high finance. In many respects, her... Next

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