[msla]

> Some (not all!) of the techniques at places like RenTec are fairly sophisticated. Hence their returns ;)

Non sequitur. A chimp throwing darts can beat professional brokers.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/rickferri/2012/12/20/any-monkey...

Maybe their sophistication is a really good PRNG? Or just one that smells of bananas?

Or maybe they've lucked into a model which happens to be doing well now, but won't after the market shifts a bit. Like how the random pickers above did well because random picks include a lot of small companies, and small companies did well over the period being considered in the study.

[deepnotderp]

Go calculate the p-value of making 66% before fees for 30+ years.

[roenxi]

Which still leaves a non-sequiter in saying the sophisticated methods led to the high returns. It is more likely to be some form of 'cheating' where they are actually making the money off something that isn't normal trading. Or even corruption in the worst case.

Beating the market by very large margins is a suspicious activity. If raw mathematical insight is enough to get a 66% return then there are a lot of mathematicians out thereto figure out what is happening. If that is the secret sauce it would be extraordinary in a history littered with best performers who were just flat out frauds.