Takashi Kotegawa (nickname BNF / J-Com man), 39-year-old (2018) with a net worth of 185 million USD (2008) is Japan’s most famous day trader.

Rail thin, with a shaggy mop of hair, often wearing a gray sweater, jeans, and sneakers no one would have taken him for a multimillionaire.

But Takashi Kotegawa has been described as a hermit who turned his college part-time work savings, the yen equivalent of $13,000, into over $150 million in 8 years.

In the process, Takashi Kotegawa has become a cult figure among Japanese day traders, a tight circle of self-taught professionals who take pride in working one of the world’s most active markets.

The most expensive things he has bought recently, circa the video, are two Nintendo Wiis and he only eats cup ramen.

After FOMC’s interest rate cut Takashi Kotegawa sold all his stock holdings in financial sector stocks etc…) and he earned 400 million yen by the close of morning trading. He said to the announcer, “I don’t know Japanese stock market’s future. I don’t look at the market from a long-term perspective. ”

The Japanese market has been buoyed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, the Bank of Japan flooding the market with cash via an asset-buying program. So all that liquidity sloshing around in the market has made it very profitable to be a Japanese day trader.

Japanese day traders have gotten so big, the market can no longer ignore them or the huge price swings they amplify, says David Baran, a co-chief executive officer of Symphony Financial Partners, a $400 million Tokyo hedge fund firm.

Takashi Kotegawa big break came when a trader working for Mizuho made a fat finger error.

Rather than selling a single share of a small recruiting company called J-Com Co. for ¥610,000, Mizuho offered 610,000 shares for ¥1 each. The order was for 42 times the number of outstanding shares.

Takashi Kotegawa saw it had to be an error and was among a small number of day traders and institutional investors who pounced. Takashi Kotegawa made more than ¥2 billion, according to a Bloomberg News report at the time.

He recently bought a condominium in cash worth 400 million yen.

He does not feel a need to spend money but prefers to watch TV and play video games. Recently he bought two Wii’s which were the largest recent expenditures. He paid for his own apartment in cash and bought his parents a new car. But he does not like to look at his savings because he believes it distracts him from his trading.

In October 2008 he bought an entire office building in the center of Akihabara for 9 billion yen (77 million dollars).

The reason?
He had too much cash and wanted to diversify because the growth in stock trading has slowed down. End of 2008 his net worth was estimated to be 21,8 billion yen (185 million dollars).

The most expensive things Takashi Kotegawa (net worth of 185 million USD) has bought recently are two Nintendo Wiis and he only eats cup ramen

INVESTMENT STYLE

Takeshi Kotegawa’s style is mainly swing trading (although many believe him to be a day trader). He uses technical analysis to determine the lowest point to enter a position, he is a bottom fisher.

Takeshi Kotegawa also looks to buy oversold assets with the aim of profiting from an upward trend change in its price.

His diet is modified to a trading environment. For example, he prefers to take in light food, hence a daily cup noodle because he wants to keep lunchtime short and feel prepared for the midday 12:30 pm session.

On that particular day, he had a turnover of 10 billion yen (85 million dollar) and a profit of 30 million yen (255,000 dollar).

“I don’t know Japanese stock market’s future. I don’t look at the market from a long-term perspective” said Kotegawa in an interview.

But Takeshi Kotegawa tends to hold his short-term trading positions for two to six days, sometimes they last longer than a week so he his trading style would be best described as a swing trader.

Takeshi Kotegawa also doesn’t like to put all his eggs in one basket. He likes to diversify his investments. For example, recently he piled some of his trading profits into tangible assets such as property.

I don’t know Japanese stock market’s future. I don’t look at the market from a long-term perspective – Takeshi Kotegawa

LEARNING RESOURCES

See Takashi Kotegawa interview below (No English subtitles).
From the video, you can see that Takashi Kotegawa is a bit of an eccentric.

Is the secret to consistent profitability not tracking your money?
As already stated above, Takeshi Kotegawa does not like to look at his savings because he believes it distracts him from his trading. He doesn’t carry around large amounts of cash because he feels that looking at it would hurt his ability to make sound judgments when day trading. “If you care about money, you cannot successfully day trade. To me, losing $100,000 can feel better than making $6,000, if the losing trade was a good trade and the winning trade was a bad trade.”

In other words, Takashi Kotegawa views trading (a zero-sum money game) as another video game.

Takashi Kotegawa is also a mentor to other traders.

If you care about money, you cannot successfully day trade. To me, losing $100,000 can feel better than making $6,000, if the losing trade was a good trade and the winning trade was a bad trade – Takashi Kotegawa 

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Takashi Kotegawa
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