About
I'm currently 23 years old, from the Bay Area, California, and based in New York City. I'm the founder of a technology company that builds quantitative trading infrastructure for financial institutions on frontier markets.
"In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face is that, in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the new. The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends ... In the past, I have made no secret of my disdain for Chef Gusteau's famous motto: 'Anyone can cook.' But I realize, only now do I truly understand what he meant. Not everyone can become a great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere."
— Anton Ego, Ratatouille
Authentic interests include hip hop music, US politics, algorithmic trading, market microstructure, philosophy (McLuhan, Zhuang Zhou, Nietzsche), and dealmaking.
Career Journey
In high school and college, I interned at consulting companies, venture capital firms, and technology startups. These experiences sparked my interest in financial technology.
I dropped out of NYU to build Pebble, a crypto neo-bank, with two of my closest friends. The experience taught me resilience, perseverance, and what it takes to build companies from the ground up.
After Pebble, I stayed in crypto, trading with my college roommate. He left his trading desk at UBS, and we built trading infrastructure at hacker houses and accelerators - winning global hackathons.
We received invaluable mentorship and gained firsthand insights into how top trading firms operate. Our trading tools have been used by hundreds of traders to analyze trillions in volume, uncovering tens of millions of dollars in hidden trading costs.
We founded Blockhouse, to do this at scale, and now build quantitative trading strategies and infrastructure for financial institutions — leveraging state of the art technology to drive PnL across all tokenized assets.
"We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us."
— J.M. Culkin, A Schoolman's Guide to Marshall McLuhan, The Saturday Review
Reading Influences
Literature that has shaped my thinking on business, markets, and philosophy.
Give and Take
Adam Grant
Examines how success is influenced by generosity, reciprocity, and social dynamics.
The Hard Thing About Hard Things
Ben Horowitz
Insights on managing startups and making the difficult decisions that determine success or failure.
Genuine Pretending
Moeller & D'Ambrosio
On Daoist philosophy's concept of wu wei and how identity forms through social roles rather than authenticity.