The Trading Game: A Confession

An outrageous, white-knuckle journey to the dark heart of an intoxicating world - from someone who survived the trading game and then blew it all wide open

'If you were gonna rob a bank, and you saw the vault door there, left open, what would you do? Would you wait around?

Ever since he was a kid, kicking broken footballs on the streets of East London in the shadow of Canary Wharf's skyscrapers, Gary wanted something better. Something a whole lot bigger.

Then he won a competition run by a 'The Trading Game'. The a golden ticket to a new life, as the youngest trader in the whole city. A place where you could make more money than you'd ever imagined. Where your colleagues are dysfunctional maths geniuses, overfed public schoolboys and borderline psychopaths, yet they start to feel like family. Where soon you're the bank's most profitable trader, dealing in nearly a trillion dollars. A day . Where you dream of numbers in your sleep - and then stop sleeping at all.

But what happens when winning starts to feel like losing? When the easiest way to make money is to bet on millions becoming poorer and poorer - and, as the economy starts slipping off a precipice, your own sanity starts slipping with it? You want to stop, but you can't. Because nobody ever leaves .

Would you stick, or quit? Even if it meant risking everything?

I found The Trading Game in a place I didn’t expect: Istanbul Airport.

I was traveling alone from Paris to Dubai via Istanbul, with a few hours to kill on a long layover. I did what I usually do in airports—wander. I walked past the usual luxury stores, cafés, and duty-free aisles, and eventually ended up at a small bookstore tucked away in a corner.

Browsing books in a cozy bookshop is one of my favorite ways to pass time. Most of the shelves were in Turkish, but there was a small “international” section—and that’s where my eyes landed on a title that immediately felt familiar: The Trading Game by Gary Stevenson.

As someone working in the investment banking world—and as a long-time student of finance and investing—I’ve always been fascinated by trading. I’ve traded stocks and options myself, so I’m not completely foreign to market risk or decision-making under uncertainty. But I also know retail trading and institutional trading aren’t the same universe. I’ve always wanted to understand the inner workings of traders inside major banks: how they think, how they build conviction, and what the environment really feels like.

I’d also seen Gary Stevenson in YouTube clips before—introduced as someone who was “once the best trader at Citi.” That alone made me curious. So I grabbed the book, opened it, and started reading right there in the airport.

What I enjoyed most: storytelling that makes complex things feel simple

The first thing that struck me was the writing style. Stevenson narrates in a clear, direct way. He uses simple language to explain complex situations—markets, power dynamics, risk, ego, hierarchy—without turning the book into a textbook. For someone who already works in finance, that simplicity doesn’t feel “dumbed down.” It feels intentional, almost conversational, and it makes the pages move quickly.

He walks you through a big arc: from a working-class neighborhood in East London to the London School of Economics, and then into the trading floor at Citibank. That journey is the spine of the memoir, but what gives it life is the human layer around it—the way he describes colleagues, status games, pressure, insecurity, and ambition.

I also appreciated how he explains his strategy-building process and the mental discipline required to stick with a view long enough to make it work. Even if you don’t copy a “strategy” from this book, you do get a feel for how real institutional traders try to find an edge, protect it, and survive long enough to scale it.

And importantly: even after the success, he doesn’t write as if he forgot where he came from. That tension between “where I’m from” and “where I am now” stays present throughout the story, and it’s one of the reasons the memoir feels authentic.

The Tokyo chapters surprised me

One unexpected highlight was Tokyo.

When he’s transferred to Japan, the book shifts tone. The trading story continues, but the city itself becomes part of the narrative. He describes Tokyo’s cityscape, its streets, food, restaurants, and culture with enough detail that it stops feeling like background scenery.

Honestly, those sections made me want to visit Tokyo. Not in a “tourist guide” way—but in a “this place is alive and I want to feel it” way.

Where I disagree—but still respect the book

I don’t personally agree with many of the author’s views. I won’t go into the full debate here, but there are parts where his interpretations and conclusions don’t align with how I see the world.

That said, disagreement didn’t ruin the reading experience. In fact, it made it more interesting. A good memoir doesn’t have to be a manifesto you fully sign up to—it just needs to be honest, compelling, and thought-provoking. This one is.

Final verdict

Overall, I enjoyed The Trading Game. I’d recommend it to anyone who likes memoirs—especially if you’re curious about how trading works inside big banks, how traders operate under pressure, and what the culture feels like from the inside.

You’ll pick up:

a vivid look at trading floors and how institutional traders think
glimpses of strategy, discipline, and decision-making
plenty of atmosphere—London, and surprisingly, Tokyo

It’s not a “how-to-trade” manual. It’s a story. And it’s a good one.