There are a ton of liars on the internet (forums and websites) and in person as well of course. The best way to spot a liar is to evaluate their emotions (negatively charged) or if they are unable to deliver results when asked. Lets break down some examples of how to spot liars and some common lies:
Emotional Evaluation.
They are Not Happy: This by far is the most common trait amongst unsuccessful men and liars. Unhappiness can include cynicism and racism as well. These states of mind are far along the emotional spectrum and are a clear signal of a propensity to lie. Don’t get us wrong there are many unhappy people who make money or are racist, Wall Street is certainly a great example of this, but remember that an unhappy and angry person is much more likely to sell you a lie than to tell you the truth.
They Want People to Fail: This is another great way to see if someone is likely going to sell you a bunch of lies. They don’t enjoy seeing someone else succeed. If someone is truly successful, inside and out, they have no problems seeing other people succeed. Being able to distinguish between competitive and negative feelings is key.
They Always Win: The vast majority of people who are truly successful have a much longer story to tell regarding their failures rather than their success. The most successful people you meet tend to have much more interesting back stories of failure rather than a back story of complete triumph throughout. At the end of the day, everything worthwhile in life has an extremely low success rate and therefore requires large amounts of attempts and subsequent failures. Winners view failure as progress, and winners have little time to spend boasting, they want to fail more to get what they want which is usually yet another difficult worthwhile goal.
Common Lies and Inability to Deliver Results.
Women: Most guys are awful. Terrible. The way you can quickly spot their poor performance is simply by asking them how many new girls they speak to in a day or how many women they have slept with. Unless the guy is good looking be certain he is lying if he spews out any number be it 10, 40, or 500. There is a small fraction of men who actually track their performance the rest are usually the same guys who walk into clubs and put their hands in their pockets immediately. A man who boasts and pounds his chest constantly about women being “easy” is spending more time trying to win approval from his peers, this is the exact personality that will fail consistently time and time again. Notably, if you visit his hometown he sure better be able to tell you where to go on what days and at minimum give you a few pointers on what to say at the venues he recommends.
Picking Stocks: This is another common one all over the internet. Some guy or guys think they found a way to “make easy money” by trading securities. Notice the same trend… its “easy”. Unless the guy shows you a 2-3 year track record with real proof, be certain the guy is either a liar or is getting lucky in a few trades here and there. Do not spend your time taking advice without proof and continue to stash your own cash and avoid the high beta risk plays. If you really got something and are broke, shoot us an email and we’ll make you a multi-millionaire in less than a year, we’re not holding our breath. Common stock picking myths below (assuming the person is not working in a real finance position):
1) Trading Currencies: This is by far the worst, you’re in a market that never closes and if you think you can guess where all currencies are going simultaneously you’re nuts
2) Options: Options have higher average returns. Why? Leverage. If you’re 10-100x leveraging a bet that can either go up to infinity or down to zero, your downside is pegged at zero, you won’t be going negative so the positive outliers skew you up
3) Liquidity: No one is more liquid than a trading firm or hedge fund, as an individual you are simply more liquid than companies with a large stake in a company, ex: a fund with 3%+ ownership will unlikely place a market sell on the full position
4) Technical Analysis: Yes technicals move stocks and no you will not beat a set up algorithm. With the massive amounts of quants out there, there is literally no way you’re clicking buy/sell before it passes the XYZ moving average
5) Outsmarting Quants: Everyone who thinks they are faster or smarter than quants needs to read this book. If you don’t want to read it? The quants figured out Bernie Madoff was running a ponzi scheme and liquidated, game over
Pay and Savings: This one is pretty much useless. Unless someone shows you their bank statement or paycheck, assume everything being said is a complete lie. It is better to err on the side of positivity (assume they are telling the truth) and simply rely on stats from legitimate resources.
Conclusion: Unsure as to where this falls in the game or finance spectrum however the above is certainly important for everyone to understand. It is the best way to weed for bad advice, losers and liars. If the person is setting unrealistically high expectations with zero contributions and does so with a negative tone, be certain you’re dealing with a liar. If the person is rocking on all cylinders, they don’t have a need to show off, people sense it.
