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Not medical advice. The Atlas is not a substitute for a clinician who can examine you.

Testosterone, Trading & Financial Risk

The 'hour between dog and wolf' on the trading floor

Evidence grade 3 of 5, Mixed. Read how the Atlas grades evidence.

The written rationale for this grade is still being prepared.

FDA
Not applicable (behavioral science)

Reference only. Not medical advice.

This is something to take to a clinician. The Atlas can tell you what is known about testosterone, trading & financial risk in general. It cannot tell you what is happening in your body, and the difference matters most for exactly the symptoms that bring people to this page.

John Coates, a neuroscientist and former Wall Street trader, studied real traders and found that morning testosterone predicted the day's profitability, and that winning streaks raised testosterone, which in turn increased risk appetite, a potential biological amplifier of market bubbles (the 'winner effect' applied to finance). Cortisol rose with uncertainty and losses, biasing toward risk-aversion. His book 'The Hour Between Dog and Wolf' popularized the idea that markets are moved partly by trader endocrinology. The findings are intriguing and real but based on small samples; they illustrate the dynamic, feedback nature of testosterone rather than a simple 'more T = better trader' claim.

Winning traders' testosterone rose with their P&L, and so did their risk-taking.

What people take it for

These are the reasons people give for taking it. They are not effects it has been shown to have.

  • Documents testosterone's feedback role in risk-taking

What people get wrong

  • Often saidHigh testosterone makes you a better investor

    ActuallyCoates found a feedback loop (wins raise T, which raises risk appetite) that could amplify bubbles, not that high T produces good decisions. The samples were small.

Who profits, and who pushes back

Nobody is named here yet, because we have not done that work on this entry. Read that as unfinished. Somebody almost certainly sells this, and somebody almost certainly disputes it. Assume both until we have checked.

At a glance

Researcher
John Coates (ex-trader, neuroscientist)
Finding
Morning T predicted daily P&L; wins raised T and risk
Caveat
Small samples; illustrative not definitive

What this entry does not yet cover

What follows is unfinished work on our side, not a finding about Testosterone, Trading & Financial Risk. A short entry is not a safe entry.

  • Timeline. We have not built the dated record of research and regulatory events.
  • Cost and market. We have not documented what it sells for or who sells it.
  • Supply chain. We have not mapped where it is made.
  • Who uses it. We have not documented the user groups.
  • What could change. No forward-looking summary yet.
  • How it compares. We have not set it against the alternatives.
  • Children and teenagers. We have not checked what is known about younger people.
  • What can go wrong. We have not written the risk line for this one. Read the safety section below rather than treating its absence as reassurance.
  • Where we land. We have not taken a position on this yet.

Sources

The studies below are named and described, but not linked. You cannot open them from here and check our reading against them, which means this page is our summary of the literature rather than a document you can verify. Weigh it accordingly until the links exist.

The studies that matter

  • Coates & Herbert2008

    In real traders, higher morning testosterone predicted greater daily profit; the win-driven T rise increased subsequent risk-taking (PNAS)