What is a trader ?

Victor Niederhoffer is/was holding a contest asking for description of What is trader? 

Given below are three of my fav entries. Hope you enjoy reading them. 

My unofficial entry: I would define a trader as "an intellectual entrepreneur: one who generates ideas and manages their risk and reward within a competitive financial marketplace." This is why the term "speculator" is an accurate one. The derivation of "speculator" is from the Latin meaning "contemplation, observation" and by the mid 15th century came to mean "pursuit of the truth by means of thinking". Ayn Rand regarded the trader as an ideal, as one who offers value for value, rather than living off the efforts of others. The trader also represents Rand's ideal of man as a thinking animal: one who relies on his/her perception in pursuit of the truth and is willing to accept the risks of that reliance to achieve superior returns.

(submitted by Brett Steenbarger)

It is said that trading is about fear and greed. I disagree. Trading is 80% pain and 20% relief. The steady state of a trader is one of mild pain amidst a backdrop of high alertness. That base state is interrupted by bouts of acute pain as the market twists one's wrist, and seemingly fewer periods of pleasurable relief, as a trade works out in one's favor. The immense difficulty of endeavor lies not in handling the wrist twisting. Rather, it is the understanding that the relief of each winning trade will inevitably be followed once again by the gut-wrenching, anxiety-inducing, unresolved pain of the waiting game.

Sent by Enis Taner

An old trader hired a new young trader to work at his firm. Every day they trade cans of sardines for companies in Italy and America, always settling the contracts before physical delivery is required. One day, the young trader gets engaged to his girlfriend and takes three cans of sardines home from the firm's warehouse to have a celebratory dinner with her. Upon opening a can, he finds that it contains no sardines, only sand. He opens the other two cans and is surprised to find they also contain only sand. The next day he tells the old trader about this. The old trader smiles and says, "those cans are not for eating, just for trading."

by anon

the rest can be read here

http://www.dailyspeculations.com/wordpress/?p=10091