Editors letter
Energy: The New Taste Sensation
It's official: Independent software vendors (ISVs) playing in the energy markets are the flavor of the month.
Get Ready for Super Tuesday, IMD-Style
Anyone following the US Democratic and Republican primaries will be aware that time is running out to be nominated and pick winning candidates in the lead-up to so-called Super Tuesday. In Inside Market Data 's case, Super Tuesday will be on April 29-the…
Dark Pool Enigma
Editor's Letter
Editor’s Letter: What don't you want?
My introduction to the internet came relatively late. It was the beginning of 1996 and I was teaching at an independent school in the Natal Midlands of South Africa. Seriously.
The hedge vote By Phil Albinus
This is payday for political junkies in the US - we've seen some mildly acrimonious attack ads, fresh faces, candidates who can make history, and others who are clearly deluded if they think they have a chance of getting anywhere near the Oval Office…
The Shock in SocGen
Last week's €4.9 billion ($7.2 billion) write-down by Société Générale (SocGen) for losses incurred by junior trader Jérome Kerviel has finally dethroned former Barings Bank bad boy Nick Leeson as the poster boy for unauthorized trading.
Opra Sneezes, Exchanges Get the Hiccups
Much of the financial markets' technology focus post 9/11 has centered on business continuity, resiliency, and eliminating single points of failure, where an issue with one link in the chain that is today's financial markets can potentially impact all…
The Exchanges Strike Back
What a difference a week can make. Last week the industry was wondering what NYSE Euronext CEO Duncan Niederauer planned to purchase and he surprised us with a twofer-the American Stock Exchange (Amex) and Wombat Financial Software.
A Busy Week for the NYSE and Friends
According to Benjamin Disraeli, there are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Allow me to add another category-rumors. Sometimes these rumors get swept under the carpet; other times they turn out to be true. Take, for example, the New York Stock Exchange,…
And Then There Were Five?
According to press reports, NYSE Euronext chairman Duncan Neiderauer is following in his predecessor's footsteps with the rumored purchase of the American Stock Exchange (Amex), one of the few non-demutualized exchanges left in the U.S.
Will "Caring" Exchanges Prevent Flight to MTFs?
We've barely begun 2008, yet already our front page is filled with news from the participants in what will be one of the key battlegrounds for this year-the struggle for trading volumes between exchanges, ECNs and new, multiple dealer-backed venues,…
New Year, Old Challenges
The beginning of every January brings that short, but brilliant, burst of collective optimism that this year will be better than last year: Business will pick up, IT will have enough resources to meet all the demands placed upon it by the business lines…
Welcome Back... and Welcome!
I was fortunate to be invited to spend the holidays this year in the company of friends in the San Francisco area. On Christmas Day, I was presented with a gift marked "from Satan." A typo, I wondered? Is Santa dyslexic? Sadly no-the gift that emerged…
Back and Forth
LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
Editor’s Letter - All grown up
December and January editor's letters in just about every magazine ranging from Calligraphy Monthly to GQ are almost certain to carry either a retrospective analysis of the year that's been or a prospective view of the year to come... or both. Perhaps…
The party's over
Like other sectors of the financial services industry, hedge fund and buy-side managers took quite a beating in 2007, and the carnage is expected by all but the most obstinately optimistic observers to continue well into 2008. Despite recent short…
The bust of 2008
Making predictions can be either an embarrassing or an enlightening exercise. A recent blog posting that made the Incisive Media rounds last month was a reproduction of a page from a 1900-era edition of the Ladies' Home Journal . In the gloriously dense…
A Market Data Christmas Carol
After returning home from the FISD's holiday party last week, I was woken by the sounds of a horrible wailing and the noise of chains dragging on the ground as the specter of late, great market data manager Jake Marley appeared before me.
No Rest for the Wicked
Given how much end users and data vendors complain about the burgeoning Opra feed of US options data, you might think they would have been grateful for a little respite. Not so, apparently, because when a double-punch hardware and software failure…
Bad Credit? You're Fired!
We've all seen the TV ads: "Bad credit? No credit? No problem! Call 1-800-LOAN-SHARK." ... Or something like that. But could this year's credit crunch have more personal ramifications? Apparently, because at a briefing hosted by sibling Inside Reference…
A Question of Time
LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
Editor's letter: The link between Van Gogh and CDOs
The notion of spending large fortunes, equivalent to the GDP of a small African country, on a Van Gogh painting, is frankly, absurd. The intrinsic value of a Van Gogh - Sunflowers, Irises, The Starry Night or otherwise - is only a few dollars. Paintings…