The Riches On Fx

Top five trading tips from Dragon's Den's Richard Farleigh

The early years

Multi-millionaire Farleigh, originally hails from Australia and has a rags-to-riches tale worthy of a Hollywood film. Born in the outback, with an abusive alcoholic father, he went into foster care aged two. From a young age Farleigh was considered reclusive and struggled at school and was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome for a period of time.

Indeed his love of chess and puzzles as a child is not at odds with some of the characteristics associated with this form of autism and led to a natural aptitude for mathematics. Farleigh competed in chess tournaments across Australia and with his success came increased confidence and better performance at school.

So much so that Farleigh was awarded a scholarship by the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) to study economics at the University of New South Wales. From the age of 23, Farleigh did a stint as an investment banker in the derivatives division for Bankers Trust Australia, which led him to develop trading principles that he still abides by today. By the age of 27 he was the youngest director in an Australian Bank ever and in his early 30s he was earning a seven-figure salary as the star trader of the bank.

Aged 34, Farleigh retired from trading and started to look for investment opportunities within the smaller company sector, both at home and abroad. It is this interest that meshed so well with the Dragon's Den idea of taking a punt on start-up businesses and led to Farleigh's appearance in the third and fourth series in the UK.

Unlike many high-earning traders Farleigh disliked the idea of flirting with risk and developed principles solely designed to limit it.

Here are five of his most feted rules for a successful trading strategy...

1. Different markets have many useful similarities

Farleigh says: "For those of you who just want to trade FX you're already limiting yourselves a little bit. If you have a view on a situation often it will lead you to different markets. You have to have a genuine opportunity and be sure there is an opportunity."

For example, a view on a currency will usually stem from a view on that country's economy.

If you are long on the Australian dollar, why not think about the themes that have led you to take that position and whether you can benefit from investment in those. Links with China, high demand for its commodities and the high yield paid by the RBA are chief reasons cited to invest in the Aussie dollar.

FX cancels The Riches

But the show's potential was never realized, either creatively or in the ratings. The show always had trouble balancing dark comedy and intense drama, and it strained to make the audience care about the Malloys, who were dealing with the consequences of stealing the American Dream. At the end of its aborted second season, FX had not committed either way to bringing the show back. Well, now we know: Mike Ausiello of EW As you can tell, I'm not surprised by this. The show's dark turn last year took away the light touches that made this show watchable. Hopefully Izzard and especially Driver -- she was nominated for an Emmy and a Golden Globe for her performance on the show -- use this as a jump-off point for more long-term TV careers. Both had a presence on the screen that I'd love to see more of over the next few years. blah blah blah i can explain blah blah blah

Mini Driver was a hideous addition to the cast. She has very limited expression of emotions, let alone intellect. She show anger and some whining in an annoying high pitched, grating screech. Look at her past movies. OMG the same thing all the time. She has a predictable behavior of whining, anger and stupid crying. David Holtzinger

I enjoyed The Riches, especially Eddie Izzard. In fact I've the last five episodes DVRed and have been waiting to watch them just prior to the beginning of season 3. Guess I won't be waiting any longer. The good shows always get dumped and the crap rises to the top. Like CBS cutting Moonlight and keeping CSI:Miami, which has got to be the most poorly written show on TV.