"People have often had the bad taste of asking me in a social setting if my day in trading was profitable. If my father were there, he would usually stop them by saying "never ask a man if he is from Sparta: if he were, he would have let you know such an important fact - and if he were not, you could hurt his feelings". Likewise, never ask a trader if he is profitable; you can easily see it in his gesture and gait. People in the profession can easily tell if traders are making or losing money; head traders are quick at identifying an employee who is faring poorly. Their ..face will seldom reveal much, as people consciously attempt to gain control of their facial expressions. But the way they walk, the way they hold the telephone, and the hesitation in their behavior, will not fail to reveal their true disposition. One cab driver in Chicago explained to me that he could tell if traders he picked up near the Chicago Board of Trade, a futures exchange, were doing well. "They get all puffed up", he said. I found it interesting (and mysterious) that he could detect it so rapidly. I later got some plausible explanation from evolutionary psychology, which claims that such physical manifestations of one's performance in life, just like an animal's dominant condition, can be used for signaling: it makes the winners seem easily visible, which is efficient in mate selection."
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