A story of INTRIGUE!
SUSPENSE!
FAST CARS!
LOOSE WOMEN!
and charty goodness.
27 Replies to “The Curious Case of the Disappearing NYSE”
Captain, an engaging and well-written read as always. If the stock marked is inflated and not a good place to park money, what is your recommendation? (By the way, nothing wrong with a trophy wife 🙂 )
With a stock market, the volume speak volumes.
A bit of a gloomy assessment, but it sounds reasonable to me, though I am unschooled in such matters.
I have a pension that I have to reinvest soon, and I have been worrying some about just where I should put it. Any free advice?
@ Karl
” Any free advice?”
Any company specializing in survival food, dry food in general or dog food. Arms and ammunition facilities are good. If you are in Canada or USA, fossil fuel energy companies are good. NO investments in ANYTHING green.
The captain is completely wrong. Declining volumes may just be indicating an aging of the investor demographic and their propensity to buy and hold rather than churn their portfolios.
Volume up or down does not correlate with prices. You can have a heavy volume day on a down market and a light volume day in an up market. Rather it indicates the breadth of involvement in the move up or down. Thus a heavy volume day either up or down is a stronger signal than a light volume day.
This is pretty simple stuff that makes me question the captains credibility.
Congratulations on realizing something that zerohedge readers have been discussing for many months. Here are a couple of things you have missed:
Thanks to the proliferation of “trade-bots” running super-sophisticated scalping algos, coupled with co-located equipment and sneaky look-aheads at orders, Wall St has been technically rigged against the retail trader for the last few years. While retail is notoriously the “dumb” money, even they have woken up to the fact, and have withdrawn their funds in a big way.
Second, any financial professional worth his salt would advise anyone approaching, let alone reaching, retirement age to transition out of stocks into less risky investments. Even though bond yields are at historic lows, people are switching out of stocks into fixed income.
Third, you talk about dividend yields and P/E’s without mentioning that the Fed Funds rate is effectively zero. When the Fed Funds rate is say 3%, dividend yields have to be somewhat higher to take into account their increased uncertainty, and P/E’s have to be restrained. (Why pay $20 for a dollar of earnings – which still need to be taxed, and then distributed as dividends – if you can spend $33 for a sure thing? And, since companies have to offer debt at a premium to the Fed, if the Fed rate is 3%, AAA companies are probably yielding close to 5%, again making the choice between buying expensive stocks and bonds easier.) I would argue in the current Fed environment, yields and P/E’s are not out of line. I still wouldn’t buy many stocks, though.
Now a couple of other points:
You wrote: This doesn’t jive with the prices we see in the market. In basic economic theory, the more trading volume there is in a market, the higher prices should be in that is shows a demand for those stocks.
Uh, no. Since there must be a seller for every buyer, volume by itself is not a significant indicator. Indicators that focus on the volume of rising stocks vs. falling stocks, such as the TRIN or Joe Granville’s OBV, are more important and indicative of trends that simple volume counts. To the extent that dumb money is seduced into markets and increases volume, that is usually considered a contrary indicator, more likely to occur at market tops.
Then, you wrote: If you want to consider the “underemployment” argument, that many people have left the labor force, you could argue unemployment is closer to 11%.
You would probably be surprised to learn that the BLS actually tracks just such a number! And you don’t have to argue about it, as this link shows US U6 unemployment. U6 hit 10% shortly after President Foodstamp was elected, zoomed to the 15% level, and has hovered around that number since. So, it’s not ‘11%’ – it’s about half again as much.
Finally, Zerohedge, like SDA, is displayed in pleasing black type on a white background, not annoying reverse video. You might consider this.
Thanks for the highlights Kevin. If I write about fast cars and loose women, will that get me a reprieve from the black background/white font?
OK, Cap’n, I promise this is my last post on this:
It’s not too technically difficult to change your background.
I’m freakin’ old. Reverse video is more difficult to read (just google it – I got more than a million links, and everyone I read agreed) for anything more than headlines or banners.
I’m freakin’ old. Things that are annoying or cause me eyestrain are things I don’t rush to do. Ergo, won’t be rushing back to your site in its current state.
I’m freakin’ old. I have to get my thrills vicariously, so I’d love to read about fast cars and loose women.
But only in black text on white.
Was actually contempalting writing a Harlequin romance novel, but for guys and on economics:
“She was like, totally hot. And had huge gozongas. She was my economics professor and said she woudl like totally give me an A if I slept with her. And I did. And it was totally awesome.
The End.”
Ha!
Thanx for the laff Capt’n.
The way a lot of so called professional act these days there must be a few ‘Boob U’ degrees out there.
Personally speaking, I’m a little tired of so called professionals messing up whilst collecting the big bucks for ‘conceived wisdom’ they clearly don’t have.
Most politicians come readily to mind.
How about this – the mom and pop investment is gone from the NYSE stocks. Lack of confidence in portfolio/investment managers and insider manipulation saw Mom and Pop leave the markets for bonds and metals. All NYSE volume now is insiders moving volumes around between each other trying to get something started.
Pathetic. Howabout some productivity to get the stock market going?
Occam,
That’s basically the sniper-scope-precise version.
And asking for “productivity” from AMERICANS???
We’re too busy watching Teen Idol or Jersey Shore. please don’t bother us with your holier-than-thou lecturing.
BTW, can you loan us some money? We don’t have enough to pay for everything.
Feb 2011 I split $22,000 into two “PROFESSIONALLY” managed(mangled is more like it)mutual funds.Precious metals basicly.
Last I saw it was worth $18,000. Makes you want to go postal.
Professionally managed, my royal canadian arse!
I made more in a frickin savings account, the LAST time I gave up on mutuals.It is rigged FOR SURE!!
The only reason the market is going up is that it is predicting the defeat of Mr. Obama and his stupid economic policies!
Perhaps the volume chart is just saying ‘equity speculation’ has declined this decade?
I wonder why no one in here ever comments about the smith manouver , iti s a huge leveraging tool used to purchase investments in the short term that will pay you a dividend and allow you to turn that dividend to an additional payment on your mortgage allowing you to pay it down faster, and also every principal payment you make on your mortgage your line of credit increases to purchase more invastments thus essentially allowing you to (in canada only) write of the intrest you pay on your mortgage…so right now 400k canadians are doing this in some form or another either the manulife one , the mortgageinmyway, the ing unmortgage or the origional smith manouver that turned into the smith snyder manouver …so on paper i look very dangerous and i am but i am also melting my mortgage away i will be done in under 4 years and that is on a 338k mortgage with 100k down ….so really my mortgage will be fully converted to an investment line of credit and at that point i will move the over payments on my mortgage to start paying my line of credit off at no extra cost to me …so alot of canadians 400k of them seem like they are up to there eye balls in debt but in actuallity they are purchasing investments.
this has got to have some effect on market’s somewhere , i also own oil companies,banks,gold companies, so on and so forth, i also offset some of that risk with hard asset’s like silver, and a bunch of prepper network stuff like a few bug out bags and medical supply kits, i need guns and ammo..well more of them.
does anyone see how this can look bad to the stats guy’s but understand how it is not actually that bad?
i do the smith manouver, so i own banks canadian ones,oil companies, gold companies , and i purchase silver ounces all the time just passed the 700oz mark , i just need guns and ammo well mroe of them and now that the registry is gone i will be buying alot more!! i have bug out bags and medical supplies.
The public always gets in just before the bubble breaks.
They got burned in the Nasdaq bubble.
They got burned in the housing bubble.
They are currently all invested in government long bonds the biggest bubble of them all.
There are no longer any free markets only managed economies and markets. When governments around the world open the money printing spigots invest for inflation. When they cut back on printing cut back on your investments. There is no buy and hold because there are no stable currencies in a fiat world. The volatility is caused by government intervention.
eastern paul
Yeah been there….after the cash value of a Chartered bank mutual dropped steadily to about 80% of the original….I attended at the bank to cash the sucker….get off.
The guy behind the counter,obtuse young fella, looked at the statement and gushed on how well this fund was performing…..When that was not enthusiatically received…..he lamely pointed out how my fund had grown…..more units.
He was at a loss to explain how such a decline in cash value was growth.
It’s called churning….they trade too often…..produce/realize a nominal profit—-which increases “units”….but then charge trading fees which erode the cash value. IOW the fees exceed any investment income….
Zerohedge vs. the Capt’n.
Both fun to read, both raise interesting points to reflect upon … and both equally delusional at times.
Thanks guys.
But I do agree that the white on black is irritating. I guess some folks is just wired differently.
Firstly, I work in finance, and spend some time supporting trading, so I have some exposure to what is going on on the big board. It’s worse than the Captain thinks, but for all the wrong reasons.
It might surprise y’all to know that you too can algo-trade all you want. Download most trading platforms, and check it out. HFT is like anything else automated (I liken it to autopilot – you wouldn’t want to rely on it exclusively in a dogfight). There is a place for it, and it sure is fun to dink around with, but they are a lot like bridge programs, not chess programs. They are no match in the long run, for a super good trader. For a good prop-trading team like many banks have? Forget it. Mostly hype. (By the way what killed you in the flash-crash was the margin calls, and that’ll hit you no matter what frequency you trade at! I support changes to the margin requirements – you should be able to ride out a sudden hit. That’s a regulation thing.)
For every hedge fund making a gazillion dollars algo-ing, there are two or three bleeding badly because their bot is incorrectly calibrated. Or quite simply, because the strategy they have coded for their bots is incorrect. If your strategy is flawed, the bot will simply magnify your losses for you, and punish you badly. OR, they have created the bot to zero-out a massive directional bet. And the bet broke bad.
Myth number 1: you can’t trade and do well because the bots will always win. Truth: depends on what you’re trying to do. I know plenty of people who override their bots all the time.
Now for the big board. It’s very simple. Basel III. Read it, and you’ll see what’s going on. Risk management has been mandated – and the measures required are regulatory. That means that pensions and insurance companies can no longer count government bonds as negative exposure in counterparty credit risk. Wrong-way risk abounds. So the funds are dumping bonds (slowly) while they gobble up Apple – who are now the unwitting proxy stand-ins for a low-risk, low growth asset class). You can’t afford Apple now unless you’re very big. Apple has very little room left to grow, but a big pension fund doesn’t care, because at least they’re not close to default. Low interest rates actually represent a catastrophic risk to pensions. Sovereign debt is bordering on junk.
Myth 2. Bonds are safe. No they’re not. And when rates rise (and they will, G_D knows, they will) the run on existing bonds is going to be ugly. You will see bond write-downs of 50 to 80%. Who in their right mind can afford a bond-issue in the last couple of years? Think about going out today and buying a 5 year 3% note. What happens when interest rates are at 5%, and bonds are offering 7 or 8%? What do you think you could sell a negative 400bps spread for?
Up goes the board?
Black on white is like looking at a light bulb. As for what to invest in the only choice is physical silver, gold and bullets. Everything else is worthless paper. Never buy a “gold certificate” it’s as phony as the “dollars” in your wallet.
I can see it now.
2027 the Captain dies.
Gathered around his grave are the kind Canadians and Americans who charitably read his blog.
When they speak, do they mention his…
ability to predict markets?
ability to turn the country around as President Clarey wherein he smote all religions, checked the Chinese and invaded North Korea to turn it into a tax haven paradise?
or his accomplishmnets to implement free market reforms and increase GDP per capita to $250,000 in the western world?
No.
They all rip him apart saying with an Abe Simpson voice,
“I LOST MY EYE SIGHT BECAUSE OF HIS CARNTIFFENSNOFFEL BLASTED BLACK BACKGROUND AND WHITE TEXT! DAMN HIM TO HEEEEEELLLLLLLL!”
I love you guys.
Whenever I am at a white on black website and I don’t want to read it that way (Mac. Use your PC equivalent) I just select all. Launch any text app. Paste. Select all and color the type black. It takes a minute and a half. No whining necessary.
KevinB said,’Thanks to the proliferation of “trade-bots” running super-sophisticated scalping algos…’
This is probably simplistic, but I get really annoyed at the anger over robo-trades. If it’s such a big deal, then for goodness sake apply a technological solution. Someone teach the market IT guys what a rate limiting firewall does.
Add a 1 second, 10 second, whatever reconnection limit on everything coming in and boom, no more robo-trades on the millisecond. (assuming standard network connections, etc).
Probably PO a bunch of Wall St. punks but really, who cares?
lance, bbss:
You both neglected the second half of my sentence re: robo-trades. The fact the systems of certain traders are co-located on the exchange premises is a huge advantage – no latency on data transfer! There is a delay traversing routers, switches, etc., and when you’re talking milliseconds, it becomes significant.
Second, for a while, certain traders were given a 30-ms “look ahead” at incoming orders – inconsequential in human terms, massive when you’re talking about HFT. The trading advantage this delivers became apparent when the prop desk at Goldman Sachs went an entire quarter with just a single losing day last year.
As more “ordinary” people became aware of these factors, trading volumes on Wall St started going down. It was hard enough to make money when the system was relatively fair; it’s almost impossible when the biggest players get a whole bunch of technical advantages in addition to better access to info, more money to throw into the mix, and when (hi Goldman Sachs!), your retail brokers are telling clients to do exactly the opposite from what your prop desk is doing. (Anywhere else, this would be a massive conflict of interest; at GS, they make clients sign an account agreement that specifically states that GS may trade against the advice given to clients.)
Kevin, I _guarantee_ you that there are firewalls and other sundry devices (plural intended) between ‘x’ exchange and whatever buildings network.
I don’t believe it is safe to assume that simply being connected to the paths in a building imply faster access to the gateways of another node in the building. There are a lot of other variables in play.
Robo-trades are a technological problem. They demand a technological solution.
Captain, an engaging and well-written read as always. If the stock marked is inflated and not a good place to park money, what is your recommendation? (By the way, nothing wrong with a trophy wife 🙂 )
With a stock market, the volume speak volumes.
A bit of a gloomy assessment, but it sounds reasonable to me, though I am unschooled in such matters.
I have a pension that I have to reinvest soon, and I have been worrying some about just where I should put it. Any free advice?
@ Karl
” Any free advice?”
Any company specializing in survival food, dry food in general or dog food. Arms and ammunition facilities are good. If you are in Canada or USA, fossil fuel energy companies are good. NO investments in ANYTHING green.
The captain is completely wrong. Declining volumes may just be indicating an aging of the investor demographic and their propensity to buy and hold rather than churn their portfolios.
Volume up or down does not correlate with prices. You can have a heavy volume day on a down market and a light volume day in an up market. Rather it indicates the breadth of involvement in the move up or down. Thus a heavy volume day either up or down is a stronger signal than a light volume day.
This is pretty simple stuff that makes me question the captains credibility.
Congratulations on realizing something that zerohedge readers have been discussing for many months. Here are a couple of things you have missed:
Thanks to the proliferation of “trade-bots” running super-sophisticated scalping algos, coupled with co-located equipment and sneaky look-aheads at orders, Wall St has been technically rigged against the retail trader for the last few years. While retail is notoriously the “dumb” money, even they have woken up to the fact, and have withdrawn their funds in a big way.
Second, any financial professional worth his salt would advise anyone approaching, let alone reaching, retirement age to transition out of stocks into less risky investments. Even though bond yields are at historic lows, people are switching out of stocks into fixed income.
Third, you talk about dividend yields and P/E’s without mentioning that the Fed Funds rate is effectively zero. When the Fed Funds rate is say 3%, dividend yields have to be somewhat higher to take into account their increased uncertainty, and P/E’s have to be restrained. (Why pay $20 for a dollar of earnings – which still need to be taxed, and then distributed as dividends – if you can spend $33 for a sure thing? And, since companies have to offer debt at a premium to the Fed, if the Fed rate is 3%, AAA companies are probably yielding close to 5%, again making the choice between buying expensive stocks and bonds easier.) I would argue in the current Fed environment, yields and P/E’s are not out of line. I still wouldn’t buy many stocks, though.
Now a couple of other points:
You wrote: This doesn’t jive with the prices we see in the market. In basic economic theory, the more trading volume there is in a market, the higher prices should be in that is shows a demand for those stocks.
Uh, no. Since there must be a seller for every buyer, volume by itself is not a significant indicator. Indicators that focus on the volume of rising stocks vs. falling stocks, such as the TRIN or Joe Granville’s OBV, are more important and indicative of trends that simple volume counts. To the extent that dumb money is seduced into markets and increases volume, that is usually considered a contrary indicator, more likely to occur at market tops.
Then, you wrote: If you want to consider the “underemployment” argument, that many people have left the labor force, you could argue unemployment is closer to 11%.
You would probably be surprised to learn that the BLS actually tracks just such a number! And you don’t have to argue about it, as this link shows US U6 unemployment. U6 hit 10% shortly after President Foodstamp was elected, zoomed to the 15% level, and has hovered around that number since. So, it’s not ‘11%’ – it’s about half again as much.
Finally, Zerohedge, like SDA, is displayed in pleasing black type on a white background, not annoying reverse video. You might consider this.
Thanks for the highlights Kevin. If I write about fast cars and loose women, will that get me a reprieve from the black background/white font?
OK, Cap’n, I promise this is my last post on this:
It’s not too technically difficult to change your background.
I’m freakin’ old. Reverse video is more difficult to read (just google it – I got more than a million links, and everyone I read agreed) for anything more than headlines or banners.
I’m freakin’ old. Things that are annoying or cause me eyestrain are things I don’t rush to do. Ergo, won’t be rushing back to your site in its current state.
I’m freakin’ old. I have to get my thrills vicariously, so I’d love to read about fast cars and loose women.
But only in black text on white.
Was actually contempalting writing a Harlequin romance novel, but for guys and on economics:
“She was like, totally hot. And had huge gozongas. She was my economics professor and said she woudl like totally give me an A if I slept with her. And I did. And it was totally awesome.
The End.”
Ha!
Thanx for the laff Capt’n.
The way a lot of so called professional act these days there must be a few ‘Boob U’ degrees out there.
Personally speaking, I’m a little tired of so called professionals messing up whilst collecting the big bucks for ‘conceived wisdom’ they clearly don’t have.
Most politicians come readily to mind.
How about this – the mom and pop investment is gone from the NYSE stocks. Lack of confidence in portfolio/investment managers and insider manipulation saw Mom and Pop leave the markets for bonds and metals. All NYSE volume now is insiders moving volumes around between each other trying to get something started.
Pathetic. Howabout some productivity to get the stock market going?
Occam,
That’s basically the sniper-scope-precise version.
And asking for “productivity” from AMERICANS???
We’re too busy watching Teen Idol or Jersey Shore. please don’t bother us with your holier-than-thou lecturing.
BTW, can you loan us some money? We don’t have enough to pay for everything.
Feb 2011 I split $22,000 into two “PROFESSIONALLY” managed(mangled is more like it)mutual funds.Precious metals basicly.
Last I saw it was worth $18,000. Makes you want to go postal.
Professionally managed, my royal canadian arse!
I made more in a frickin savings account, the LAST time I gave up on mutuals.It is rigged FOR SURE!!
The only reason the market is going up is that it is predicting the defeat of Mr. Obama and his stupid economic policies!
Perhaps the volume chart is just saying ‘equity speculation’ has declined this decade?
I wonder why no one in here ever comments about the smith manouver , iti s a huge leveraging tool used to purchase investments in the short term that will pay you a dividend and allow you to turn that dividend to an additional payment on your mortgage allowing you to pay it down faster, and also every principal payment you make on your mortgage your line of credit increases to purchase more invastments thus essentially allowing you to (in canada only) write of the intrest you pay on your mortgage…so right now 400k canadians are doing this in some form or another either the manulife one , the mortgageinmyway, the ing unmortgage or the origional smith manouver that turned into the smith snyder manouver …so on paper i look very dangerous and i am but i am also melting my mortgage away i will be done in under 4 years and that is on a 338k mortgage with 100k down ….so really my mortgage will be fully converted to an investment line of credit and at that point i will move the over payments on my mortgage to start paying my line of credit off at no extra cost to me …so alot of canadians 400k of them seem like they are up to there eye balls in debt but in actuallity they are purchasing investments.
this has got to have some effect on market’s somewhere , i also own oil companies,banks,gold companies, so on and so forth, i also offset some of that risk with hard asset’s like silver, and a bunch of prepper network stuff like a few bug out bags and medical supply kits, i need guns and ammo..well more of them.
does anyone see how this can look bad to the stats guy’s but understand how it is not actually that bad?
i do the smith manouver, so i own banks canadian ones,oil companies, gold companies , and i purchase silver ounces all the time just passed the 700oz mark , i just need guns and ammo well mroe of them and now that the registry is gone i will be buying alot more!! i have bug out bags and medical supplies.
The public always gets in just before the bubble breaks.
They got burned in the Nasdaq bubble.
They got burned in the housing bubble.
They are currently all invested in government long bonds the biggest bubble of them all.
There are no longer any free markets only managed economies and markets. When governments around the world open the money printing spigots invest for inflation. When they cut back on printing cut back on your investments. There is no buy and hold because there are no stable currencies in a fiat world. The volatility is caused by government intervention.
eastern paul
Yeah been there….after the cash value of a Chartered bank mutual dropped steadily to about 80% of the original….I attended at the bank to cash the sucker….get off.
The guy behind the counter,obtuse young fella, looked at the statement and gushed on how well this fund was performing…..When that was not enthusiatically received…..he lamely pointed out how my fund had grown…..more units.
He was at a loss to explain how such a decline in cash value was growth.
It’s called churning….they trade too often…..produce/realize a nominal profit—-which increases “units”….but then charge trading fees which erode the cash value. IOW the fees exceed any investment income….
Zerohedge vs. the Capt’n.
Both fun to read, both raise interesting points to reflect upon … and both equally delusional at times.
Thanks guys.
But I do agree that the white on black is irritating. I guess some folks is just wired differently.
Firstly, I work in finance, and spend some time supporting trading, so I have some exposure to what is going on on the big board. It’s worse than the Captain thinks, but for all the wrong reasons.
It might surprise y’all to know that you too can algo-trade all you want. Download most trading platforms, and check it out. HFT is like anything else automated (I liken it to autopilot – you wouldn’t want to rely on it exclusively in a dogfight). There is a place for it, and it sure is fun to dink around with, but they are a lot like bridge programs, not chess programs. They are no match in the long run, for a super good trader. For a good prop-trading team like many banks have? Forget it. Mostly hype. (By the way what killed you in the flash-crash was the margin calls, and that’ll hit you no matter what frequency you trade at! I support changes to the margin requirements – you should be able to ride out a sudden hit. That’s a regulation thing.)
For every hedge fund making a gazillion dollars algo-ing, there are two or three bleeding badly because their bot is incorrectly calibrated. Or quite simply, because the strategy they have coded for their bots is incorrect. If your strategy is flawed, the bot will simply magnify your losses for you, and punish you badly. OR, they have created the bot to zero-out a massive directional bet. And the bet broke bad.
Myth number 1: you can’t trade and do well because the bots will always win. Truth: depends on what you’re trying to do. I know plenty of people who override their bots all the time.
Now for the big board. It’s very simple. Basel III. Read it, and you’ll see what’s going on. Risk management has been mandated – and the measures required are regulatory. That means that pensions and insurance companies can no longer count government bonds as negative exposure in counterparty credit risk. Wrong-way risk abounds. So the funds are dumping bonds (slowly) while they gobble up Apple – who are now the unwitting proxy stand-ins for a low-risk, low growth asset class). You can’t afford Apple now unless you’re very big. Apple has very little room left to grow, but a big pension fund doesn’t care, because at least they’re not close to default. Low interest rates actually represent a catastrophic risk to pensions. Sovereign debt is bordering on junk.
Myth 2. Bonds are safe. No they’re not. And when rates rise (and they will, G_D knows, they will) the run on existing bonds is going to be ugly. You will see bond write-downs of 50 to 80%. Who in their right mind can afford a bond-issue in the last couple of years? Think about going out today and buying a 5 year 3% note. What happens when interest rates are at 5%, and bonds are offering 7 or 8%? What do you think you could sell a negative 400bps spread for?
Up goes the board?
Black on white is like looking at a light bulb. As for what to invest in the only choice is physical silver, gold and bullets. Everything else is worthless paper. Never buy a “gold certificate” it’s as phony as the “dollars” in your wallet.
I can see it now.
2027 the Captain dies.
Gathered around his grave are the kind Canadians and Americans who charitably read his blog.
When they speak, do they mention his…
ability to predict markets?
ability to turn the country around as President Clarey wherein he smote all religions, checked the Chinese and invaded North Korea to turn it into a tax haven paradise?
or his accomplishmnets to implement free market reforms and increase GDP per capita to $250,000 in the western world?
No.
They all rip him apart saying with an Abe Simpson voice,
“I LOST MY EYE SIGHT BECAUSE OF HIS CARNTIFFENSNOFFEL BLASTED BLACK BACKGROUND AND WHITE TEXT! DAMN HIM TO HEEEEEELLLLLLLL!”
I love you guys.
Whenever I am at a white on black website and I don’t want to read it that way (Mac. Use your PC equivalent) I just select all. Launch any text app. Paste. Select all and color the type black. It takes a minute and a half. No whining necessary.
KevinB said,’Thanks to the proliferation of “trade-bots” running super-sophisticated scalping algos…’
This is probably simplistic, but I get really annoyed at the anger over robo-trades. If it’s such a big deal, then for goodness sake apply a technological solution. Someone teach the market IT guys what a rate limiting firewall does.
Add a 1 second, 10 second, whatever reconnection limit on everything coming in and boom, no more robo-trades on the millisecond. (assuming standard network connections, etc).
Probably PO a bunch of Wall St. punks but really, who cares?
lance, bbss:
You both neglected the second half of my sentence re: robo-trades. The fact the systems of certain traders are co-located on the exchange premises is a huge advantage – no latency on data transfer! There is a delay traversing routers, switches, etc., and when you’re talking milliseconds, it becomes significant.
Second, for a while, certain traders were given a 30-ms “look ahead” at incoming orders – inconsequential in human terms, massive when you’re talking about HFT. The trading advantage this delivers became apparent when the prop desk at Goldman Sachs went an entire quarter with just a single losing day last year.
As more “ordinary” people became aware of these factors, trading volumes on Wall St started going down. It was hard enough to make money when the system was relatively fair; it’s almost impossible when the biggest players get a whole bunch of technical advantages in addition to better access to info, more money to throw into the mix, and when (hi Goldman Sachs!), your retail brokers are telling clients to do exactly the opposite from what your prop desk is doing. (Anywhere else, this would be a massive conflict of interest; at GS, they make clients sign an account agreement that specifically states that GS may trade against the advice given to clients.)
Kevin, I _guarantee_ you that there are firewalls and other sundry devices (plural intended) between ‘x’ exchange and whatever buildings network.
I don’t believe it is safe to assume that simply being connected to the paths in a building imply faster access to the gateways of another node in the building. There are a lot of other variables in play.
Robo-trades are a technological problem. They demand a technological solution.