“Just when you find the key to the market, they change the locks”

“Just when you find the key to the market, they change the locks” is an old Wall Street adage. “The trouble with some guys when they give you the keys to the city they change the locks” is a joke that was cited in 1942. “I think it was Loeb who said it, but just when you think you got the key, they change the lock” was cited in print in 1981.
 
The saying has been often credited to E.F. Hutton & Co. founding partner Gerald M. Loeb (1899-1974), but it’s not certain when he first said it.
 
Other sayings about the “key to success” include “I found the key to success, only to discover that the door was never locked,” “I looked for the key to success and then found it’s a combination lock,” “If you can’t find the key to success, pick the lock,” “Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success” and “Successful pianists know the key to success.”
   
   
Wikipedia: Gerald M. Loeb
Gerald Loeb (July 1899 – April 13, 1974) was a founding partner of E.F. Hutton & Co., a renowned Wall Street trader and brokerage firm. He was the author of the books The Battle For Investment Survival and The Battle For Stock Market Profits. Loeb promoted a view of the market as too risky to hold stocks for the long term in contrast to well known value investors. He also created the Gerald Loeb Award, given annually for excellence in various categories of financial journalism.
   
31 August 1942, Portsmouth (OH) Times, “Minego’s Sports Gossip,” pg. 8, col. 5:
The trouble with some guys when they give you the keys to the city they change the locks.
 
12 July 1965, Oakland (CA) Tribune, “How Mays Missed Playing For Braves” (AP), pg. 38D, col. 7:
But Willie wasn’t and Bill Maughn is left with the same feeling as a guy who found a key to Fort Knox but by the time he got there they change the lock.
 
10 June 1981, The Times-Picayune (New Orleans, LA), “A Wall Street wonder—no bull” by Angus Lind, sec, 6, pg. 2, col. 2:
“I think it was Loeb who said it, but just when you think you got the key, they change the lock.”
(Spoken by Lawrence Glass.—ed.)
 
9 November 1983, Kokomo (IN) Tribune, “An investment in warfare products might prove wise” by John M. Kefauver, pg. 13:
I can’t; but don’t forget the old Wall Street adage—“every time we think we have found the key to success in the market they change the locks on us!”
 
13 June 1984, Kokomo (IN) Tribune, “Two sides to interest rate coin” by John M. Kefauver, pg. 24, col. 3:
It all goes to prove that any time you think you have a key to a sure thing in Wall Street, they change the lock on you!
     
Silicon Investor
To: Drbob512 who started this subject
From: shoreco
6/20/2002 4:42:22 PM
(...)
Just when you find the key to the market, they change the locks…(Art Cashen, “CNBC”)
     
Investors Hub
Friday, 10/01/04 07:59:45 PM
Re: Gizmo post# 18681
Post #  of 37180
as they say, on wall street, just when you find the key, they change the locks.
   
Perkins Capital Management, Inc.
October 25, 2006, pg. 3
DID SOMEONE CHANGE THE LOCK?
We believe it was Gerald M. Loeb who said “When you think you have found the key to the market, some S.O.B. changes the lock.”
 
Google Books
Risk Management in Commodity Markets:
From Shipping to Agriculturals and Energy
Edited by Helyette Geman
Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
2008
Pg. 256:
“Just when you think you found the key to the market, they change the locks,” declared the late Gerald Loeb, who was a highly successful financier and founding partner of E.F. Hutton, as quoted in Cashin (2008).
   
Business Insider
One Trader’s 21 Favorite Quotes About Markets And Investing
SHANE OLIVER, AMP CAPITAL, BUSINESS INSIDER AUSTRALIA APR. 30, 2014, 5:32 AM
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COMMENTS
Tmac on Apr 30, 9:02 AM said:
“Just when you figure out the key to Wall Street they change the locks”