The City should woo the fairer sex, rather than cold-shoulder it. Biologically, women are far more disposed to keep their cool –– enough to keep our economies from going broke.A fascinating study by Dr John Coates, a former derivatives trader for Goldman Sachs, reveals that there are specific biological reasons why women make better traders than men. Male hormones direct us towards boom and bust.
Female traders have generally lower testosterone levels than their male peers: the irrational gambling instinct that causes speculators to continue betting on a rising market even when fundamental analysis suggests that prices have risen too far is largely absent. Furthermore, oxytocin - the hormone whose synthesised form is employed to induce labour - is found in higher quantities in women than it is in men. One of its effects is
to neutralise the impact of cortisol, making women traders less liable to be caught in the downward spiral of the bear market. So if the trading floors had been populated by women rather than men over the past decade, it is entirely possible that the bubble and the crash might have been much less severe, if not avoided altogether.
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