Ann of Feministing cites an interesting twist on investing strategies. (Quoting a Wall Street Journal article, italics mine.)

Where Wall Street’s drug of choice used to be cocaine, today it could be estrogen. A hedge fund broker working at SAC Capital in Connecticut sued his boss in late October for allegedly demanding that he take estrogen to become a more successful trader. The case was sealed when it moved to arbitration. A spokesperson for SAC refused to comment.

Read the quote in context here.

Seriously! The real hoot is that they want estrogen-enriched traders so they… make men take supplements instead of, oh, y’know, hiring women.

I dunno. Maybe it is a need for physical size on trading floors as Feministing commenter WendyAnn hints. But I bet there’s some other reason.

That said, the effects of testosterone really are pretty misunderstood. In case after case, even species after species, aggressiveness and hostility usually crop up when levels drop.

I certainly see that in a friend who’s lost his own ability to produce it. He gets a shot about once a month and he becomes terribly irritable just before, and cheery/mellow after. I remember reading on one article or another a few years ago about scientists giving animals enough testosterone “to make a coffee cup grow antlers” without causing any increase in aggressiveness. The tricky bit is that aggressive behavior, especially successful aggression, can stimulate testosterone secretions so… So it’s still associated with aggression and risk-taking, just not the way most people assume.

And for the record, in my women’s-studies/sex-ed/communications course last quarter, in a lecture on the menstrual cycle, the prof noted that symptoms associated with PMS show up when estrogen and progesterone levels are lowest, not highest. Meaning, she said dryly, that just like men it’s usually inaccurate to say someone’s feeling “hormonal.”

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Note: I still can’t believe they don’t just hire women, though, if they want more estrogen in the workplace. Doi! Old habits die really hard I guess.