François Trahan always at the top of Wall Street (Google translation )




Jean-Philippe Décarie

La Presse

It was the first analyst to announce the decline in U.S. equity markets in the summer of 2011. Last October, while the indices were at their lowest, it was the first and only quarterback to report the return of a bull market. This particular prescience has yet allowed this year Montreal François Trahan to be named the best portfolio strategist on Wall Street.

Over the past nine years, François Trahan was named six times better strategist Wall Street stock by the magazine Institutional Investors. Three times he did not finish first, François Trahan won the second place.

This new coronation was announced Tuesday by the U.S. financial magazine, which is somehow the bible consult religiously every major institutional investors.

This is from a survey carried out with the publication of readers François Trahan was chosen. Professional investors recognize the quality and reliability of its studies and its market forecasts.

Economist, Trahan, 41, began to stand out in the world of finance when he joined the firm Bear Stearns on Wall Street in 2002. He was 33 years old and the youngest strategist global center of finance.

In 2003, he became the sixth quarterback Wall Street. In 2004, he finished second, but took first place the following year. A position he held for almost systematically.

Since 2005, the only time François Trahan has not pleased as the best portfolio strategist is when company has changed and so has reduced the rate of publication of his studies.

His gifts Oracle have both served in his professional life. In February 2007, to everyone's surprise, he left the firm Bear Stearns where he is nevertheless considered and treated as a real star. He joined ISI Group, a search box hyperspécialisée niche.

A few months later, Bear Stearns collapsed like a house of cards. François Trahan left at the right time. He was able to sell all its shares in the company at a high price.

"I was lucky. Many of my colleagues have lost their pension funds. I saw that the company was too exposed to the market and I did not like it, "he told me at the time.

The United States restart

Since February 2010, François Trahan is Vice President and Chief Strategist of Wolfe Trahan firm he founded with a former colleague of Bear Stearns. The brokerage firm has a research and sixty employees in New York.

Joined yesterday in London after a long day of meetings with clients of his firm, François Trahan had the voice of a man winnowed, but the tone was recaptured when he began to explain why institutional investors had still designated as number 1 Wall Street.

"I had two good prospects and I was the only one to do so. In March 2011, I saw the bear market emerge. Although markets remained neutral until June, It's been a downward spiral in July and August, with declines of around 20%.

"In the first week of October, the markets were at their lowest, but I said they began their ascent. I was the only negative in summer 2011 and the only positive in October and in both cases it turned out. I got a lot of attention with these predictions, "says he.

From a distance, François Trahan consults his computer and I pointed out that from October 2011 to today, the S & P 500 returned 27%. "Not bad call as" let he fall.

According to him, the markets have not finished their progression. The U.S. economy restarts significantly observes it. Among the leading indicators that promotes is that of residential housing starts.

"We have not seen it for six years, we will witness the highest growth since the 2008 crisis," he says.

After 12 years in New York, François Trahan decided to move back to Montreal last year with his young family of three children. It must commute Montreal-New York on a near weekly basis. He launched his company last April in Montreal Capital Management Trahan in setting up a hedge fund International Opportunities Fund Trahan.

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