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If you ever get the chance to speak to a veteran floor trader, you really should.



That's because they're likely full of incredible stories about the good (or bad) ole days on the floor.

They'll probably tell you about the amazing sense of camaraderie on the floor and the epic pranks they used to pull on each other.

"Every joke was invented down there," a retired NYSE specialist said.

However, the humor has subsided in recent years.

"Fortunately, or unfortunately, you don't see those pranks anymore," another veteran floor trader told Business Insider.

The reason for the pranks in the past, the trader explained, is that they helped everyone on the floor "blow off steam."

"You can't be running at 100 percent all the time. You need to break the tension and that's why on the floor, every floor, they'd have some sort of prank or joke," the trader told Business Insider.

Now traders have to worry about lower trading volumes and what's going on in the eurozone.

Another reason they're fewer pranks is that the NYSE emerged as a publicly traded company, meaning there are more sensitive eyes these days. The CME Group, which owns the Chicago Board of Trade and the New York Mercantile Exchange, is also publicly traded.

"We always had respect for what we did as a living -- it was just joking around. Once we went public the world was watching," the trader said, adding, "Now it's strictly business once everyone went public. Everyone down here is holding the utmost respect."

Veteran traders both in New York and Chicago from the NYSE, CBOT, NYMEX and AMEX told us about some of the classic pranks and jokes they used to pull back in the day.

the source