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The thing about building something from nothing, especially when you look, sound or come from a background that doesn’t fit the mold, is that you’re not just running a business. You’re running through walls.
I’ve lived that journey. I grew up in El Paso, a first-generation Mexican-American kid who learned early on that nobody was going to hand me a seat at the table. So I built one.
Over the years — starting as a linebacker at Columbia University, breaking into commodities trading, then founding OTC Global Holdings and watching it become the largest independent interdealer brokerage in the world — I