Van der Moolen, again
Van der Moolen may be bankrupt, but the stock is still open for trading. The original plan was to delist the shares on August 10th 2010. However, according to this press release the suspension of trading in the shares is postponed until the December 2010 expiration. This way the outstanding option positions in MOO are settled in a subtle and easy way.
Hercules owns 6% of VDM
Hat tip to this site for noticing. Written by Martijn Kok: a penny stock trader who accumulated over 6% in Van der Moolen shares after the crash. Maybe better known as “Hercules”, for manipulating penny stocks as Cardio Control a decade ago.
The famous memo
Next point. I received an internal memo for all employees of Van der Moolen. It’s written by CEO Richard den Drijver two years ago. It’s old, but genuine and an entertaining read nevertheless. All employees must have known. A few of his famous lines made it frequently to the comments.
From: +Risk Management [mailto:RiskManagement@nl.vandermoolen.com]
Sent: dinsdag 25 maart 2008 16:49
To: (…)
Subject: FW: Time for Change please forward to those who did not receive it.
Dear colleagues,
On the web side off VDM, we have presented the strategic presentation 2008 which most of you have received with the press release for the year 2007 last week.
Be free to forward this text to the staff members, traders, and brokers who were not copied in.
I and Michiel as board off VDM like to share some further information about the future and the changes we need to accomplice for the next 114 years.
Time for Change
Last week we have had the yearly VDM press and annalist meeting for the year 2007.
The Board of VDM (WE) made the promise to the shareholders to be profitable in 2008.
We also explained that the VDM focus would be three business lines:
1) VDM Trading
2) VDM Institutional brokerage
3) VDM Retail Banking
Partnership’s can only work if WE (all partners/ stakeholders within VDM ) can share and benefit from the success of VDM only than those who are the WE can commit them self to the future of VDM.
First, learn to share, if you cannot share you will never learn to multiple
Important to understand who are WE? We are the stakeholders in VDM being:
Share holders, Supervisory Board, Board, Management, Support staff and Traders/Brokers.
To make the future a success we have to learn from the past
The last 5 years share holders did not make anything the stock went from high EU 30 to
low EU 3 and currently trade on the expectation of zero future earnings why?
When we look to what happened to VDM in the US (the loss of hundreds off millions of dollars). This happen when traders violate trading rules in 2003-2005 ore make serious trading mistakes it was always the shareholder who paid because there are no reclaims on bonuses paid out. When we have to defend the company for those actions and mistakes made by traders all legal bills are paid by VDM Holding again the shareholder. When we facilitate clients (loan desk US 2005) and kickbacks are paid ore other favors which lead to fines by the exchange again it is the shareholders who paid millions off dollars.
VDM is and was not alone in this and the security industry forces exchange regulated company to invest in procedures, controls, compliance and risk departments etc that is a part off working in this industry.
What we have recently seen happening in this industry with banks and brokers go bust, big position losses by traders ore the hiding off position losses to collect end year bonuses, substantial increases in trading margins and increase in cost of capital are leading to more and not less cost off working in this industry. Those off you who think cost related to work in this industry is not there problem and the only cost related to trade is the square meter around them should wake up. It my be that what you want bud this not how VDM can survive ore by the way any organization working in this industry can survive nor can it receive anymore the support of shareholders willing to support this attitude.
On top of that, VDM was and is still not operating as one organization. This put’s huge amounts of additional cost on VDM holding to monitor manage and support all the individual operations. In addition, global membership’s infrastructure and IT knowledge is not shared in other words not all the advances off working for one big organization are not yet in place.
Why not: Because too many participants/ individuals within the VDM group want to have there one ‘’small’’ operation within the organization this feels save and comfortable bud which create a lot off red tape and lost opportunities.
What can we learn from this : When WE as VDM do not work as an team ore as one company bud as individual company’s and within these individual company’s as individual operations where we even within these operations are not willing to share knowledge, support staff, risk, cost, investments and infrastructure there is no future.
I mentioned all stakeholders should participate in the success off VDM.
When we look to Europe in 2007 VDM Trading and VDM Institution Brokerage was a success. Over 2007 in Europe, we paid a total compensation to (only continued business in 2008) to traders off more then EU 40 mio of which was EU 23 mio was paid in bonuses. Contributed to share holders VDM from these European profitable operations was little more then EU 7 mio hardly a fare share of profit distribution between the stakeholders within VDM.
We as VDM Board see VDM Trading and VDM Institutional Brokerage as crucial in combination with VDM Retail Banking this because eventually all Retail bank end users eventually will directly trade with VDM trading ore use the facilities of VDM institutional brokerage. Bud this only will work if trading managers and traders are open to change and are willing to share cost off running these operations. You do not need to be a genius to understand that when the party is a success traders collect more the EU 40 moil and VDM shareholders collect little more then EU 7 mio and when something goes wrong and the party is over the shareholder have to pay (see the 100 off millions in the US ore discontinuing business EU), not an attractive proposition for anybody to invest in.
There are several solutions to make it work bud clear is WE all have to be willing to invest in this future and be willing to part of this bigger successful VDM group and be willing to see WE not as ME because than there is no future for YOU in this.
End 2007 the board agreed with the management EU and US that they would come with a proposal to distribute all cost over the entities and that they would come with a proposal before 1 April 2008 being effective
1 Jan 2008. Cost was only a part of this discussion more important is global trainee trading centers, networks (access to all global memberships), IT, support and capital. Times are changing so the Board will appoint a small task force with representatives from US en EU who will look at the total VDM organization and all it’s aspects and will talk with those responsible to have there input which will lead to decisions in Q2 2008 effective 1 Jan 2008 for the road map for the future and success for WE instead of only ME.
Regards,
Richard den Drijver
CEO
Van der Moolen
Keizergracht 307
Amsterdam
1001 GJ
T: +31 (0)20 535 6748
F: +31 (0)20 535 6788
E: rdrijver@nl.vandermoolen.com
W: www.vandermoolen.com
Het is natuurlijk wel zuur om 23 miljoen uit te betalen aan je handelaren terwijl je eigen aandelen met een veelvoud daarvan minder waard worden. Dat is de schuld van de handelaren! Id iss nod fer off them.
Half a year before Richard sent out this by now legendary email (i.e. summer of 2007), he was already bragging to staff that WITHIN THREE YEARS Van Der Moolen would be one of the TOP THREE GLOBAL SECURITIES FIRMS in terms of trading volume (both prop and brokerage) and profitability. You read it right. Move over Goldman, move over UBS, bye bye Lehman Brothers (oops). It wasn’t actually Richard himself who was doing the bragging, he sent expensive consultants around all of the VDM offices (Europe/US) who were distracting traders during trading hours with their bullshit presentations. It was pathetic, buy hey, as a trader you could still get a good bonus while the party lasted.
By the end of 2008 Richard was speculating about VDM’s imminent return to the AEX index (the Dutch blue chip index) – this was of course based on the forged profits in 2008 (before the impairment of the tax fraud “three time zones tax arbitrage”). Read this humorous interview online:
http://managementscope.nl/magazine/artikel/348-richard-den-drijver-van-der-moolen
(I hope the moron interviewer revisits his gloating masterpiece.)
In Richard’s defense, it is not right to put all of the blame solely on his shoulders. Onno and Egbert deserve their fair share as well (although Onno has indicated that only by the end of 2009 did he see through the idiot-formerly-known-as-RDD). “Ze stonden erbij en keken ernaar.” And kudos to Böttcher and Rondeltap for the brilliant takeover of Curvalue and their positioning of RDD as the next CEO. On behalf of all VDM employees and shareholders: thanks guys, what the hell were you thinking?!?
With 163 typos in one company wide sent message, I would not even invite this bloke for an interview upon reading his application letter… How the hell did this guy get where he was…?
What is the first sentence without errors in RDD’s memo?
Jack: Had tip???
Where is Brian Schaeffer in this story dudes? This guy…… wow
I thought RDD was the CEO?
Brian Schaeffer
Brian spent over a decade of his career as a top specialist on the NYSE. He handled the trading activities in the top equities in the US such as Disney, Hewlett Packard and Pfizer. Brian was risk manager, managing director and head of floor operations for one of the largest specialist operations on the floor. After selling the specialist firm to Lehman Brothers in 2007, Brian became CEO of a listed global trading and technology company, Van Der Moolen Capital Markets.
Brian was also an exclusive analyst for CNBC. He has appeared on many prime time shows such as Fast Money, Halftime show, Closing Bell, High Net Worth, and Morning Call.
Brian is now the COO and Head of Business Development for WTS a global proprietary trading firm.
some things never change……
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incredible how an US listed firm ken sent oud zomefing laik dis. But he was right in the underlying message. Within VDM, ME did prevail over WE. We had a number of ex VDM employees over for interviews and their stories where absolutely shocking. The sad part was they sometimes even didn’t realize it.
Unfortunately a lot of you guys make the same mistake of putting ME over WE. Many (mediocre?) traders on this website are shouting hell and damnation because they feel ‘screwed by the management, who is only filling their own pockets’ (seen that a number of times). If you feel that way, start you own firm and see how you think then!
About traders, first they are begging you to be allowed to work for you, then after a few years their ego’s are starting to balloon and they start claiming massive bonuses. They don’t realize you taught them everything, use your IT and capital, but they still expect to get paid like an entrepreneur. Come on guys, put your money where your mouth is and start your own firm!
P.S. I am not RDD, OP, or EP and did not work for VDM.
rah!!!
And 2 years later the brokerage was sold at a bottomprice and the tradingbook was sold a couple of million below market value…the Curator must have been sleeping and debtors never received their money…Unbelievable that this can happen and none of the shareholders demanded an investigation..
pretty bad to send out a firm wide memo with so many grammatical mistakes… RDD seriously lacked articulative power(amongst many other skills/qualities!)but it is true that alot of traders dont understand the true cost of their seat on a trading desk.
I remember when this email arrived. Silence in the room followed by laughter as traders and other staff read the incoherent ramblings of a mad man. I pictured old RDD sitting at his desk, teeth gritted and mouth foaming, as he bashed the words into his keyboard. That said, some of his points were valid.
Not really anonymouse.
so, which company is gonna be next to get bankrupt?
Alphabay is going down! Yeh punks!
I guess connaught is a good chance haver.
who is connaught?
Onwaarschijnlijk dat RDD deze mail zelf heeft geschreven. Curvalue had een belangrijk kantoor in Londen en RDD was misschien narcistisch maar echt niet dom.
jullie roepen allemaal wel dat RDD zo dom was, maar vergeten kennelijk het feit dat hij dus wel in staat was zijn eigen tent voor de hoofdprijs aan te duwen.
doe het maar na (!)
die mail is trouwens geschreven door lenny, RDD dicteerde wel vaker
Are you sure his assistant wrote it? I can’t believe that, as the letter is perfectly in line with RDD’s communication skills. And his assistant survived a long time working for CEO’s, and she must have been very smart with a lot of common sense..
Even if his assistant wrote it, he would have reviewed it before it was sent out.
So back to RDD’s lack of diplomacy or communication skills.
Stop defending RDD (“someone else sent out the email”) – you must be one of his Curvalue buddies who is STILL in denail.
For the record, the email is legit and came from RDD himself. Either RDD has a severe case of dyslexia or the grammar of a 3-year old. I go with the latter.
Lenny did send out emails to staff for RDD (press releases etc.). Emails sent by Lenny “on behalf of RDD” were always CLEARLY marked as such and originated from her email account. This particular email came from RDD’s own email account (and it was sent out in the middle of the night, if I remember correctly, so unless Lenny and RDD were having an affair …). It has RDD written all over it. Accept him for the idiot that he is.
In case there are still doubters out there:
http://classic.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=750346991&play=1
And don’t tell me this is actually Lenny disguised as RDD!
http://www.quotenet.nl/biz/emailen-met-richard-den-drijver-van-der-moolen.php
RDD was the best boss I ever had, you pathetic guys should show the man some more respect.
If RDD was your best ‘boss’, who was your worst?
RDD will get some repsect in jail, where he belongs.
if you tell me I will tell you
OMG…
This is the funniest thing ever!!!
you will all stay anonymous . Bunch of pathetic boring losers .
No one will ever hear from you . And rightly so .If you think RDD was wrong say so in his face , speak up or shut up .
one way or another he was in charge of the company when it blew up. He has to take the blame. End of story
It is goddam sad. I remember VDM as a great, conservative, old school trading house.
Sic transit gloria mundi…
Opgewonden standje wijkt voor niemand
11 augustus 2010
Door: Conijn, F.
Eigenzinnige Rob Defares van IMC bouwt zijn handelshuis uit tot een wereldspeler.
Rob Defares (1961) heeft de nieuwe werkelijkheid van de optiehandel snel begrepen. De oprichter van IMC volgt eind jaren tachtig het lichtend voorbeeld van Optiver en doet vanaf die tijd een beroep op wetenschappers in plaats van op voormalige marktkooplui. Inmiddels werken bij IMC wereldwijd meer dan zeshonderd mensen.
Deze groei is voor Defares bepaald profijtelijk geweest. Met een geschat vermogen van euro 90 mln staat hij in 2009 op de 281ste plek van de Quote 500. De inmiddels uitgetreden medeoprichter René Schelvis is in die lijst op de 470ste plaats terug te vinden.
De voorliefde voor de wetenschap kreeg Defares van huis uit mee. Zijn vader is de bekende arts James Defares, die met zijn baanbrekende onderzoek naar kanker ook op internationale aandacht kon rekenen. James was bijzonder hoogleraar aan de Universiteit Leiden, een post die hij in 1975 opgaf toen hij in de medische wereld omstreden was geraakt door zijn voorliefde voor het betwiste moermandieet.
Indisch bloed
Vanwege zijn Indische bloed werd Defares in zijn begintijd op de optievloer de ‘witte neger’ genoemd. Hij was een opgewonden standje dat het herhaaldelijk met zijn tegenpartij aan de stok had. Als hij dan woedend uitviel, werd in alle hoeken van de optiebeurs ‘Heaven Must Be Missing an Angel’ gezongen, een hit van de Amerikaanse popgroep Tavares.
Tot op de dag van vandaag wordt Defares omschreven als een drukke man die ‘snel denkt en snel en luid praat’. ‘Als ik een afspraak met hem heb, blijft hij zijn mobiele telefoon gewoon beantwoorden’, zegt een optiehandelaar. ‘Eigenlijk vind ik dat wat onbeleefd, zeker wanneer hij dan ook nog een aantal wisselgesprekken voert. Het is net alsof hij last heeft van ADHD.’
Horloge
Een andere bron stoort zich minder aan deze druktemakerij. ‘Natuurlijk heeft hij een grote mond die hij overal laat horen. Maar het ontbreekt hem nooit aan inhoud en visie. Zo was hij de eerste die zijn activiteiten van handelaar uitbreidde met een eigen bank en een eigen broker. Optiver heeft ook een poging in die richting gewaagd, maar dat bedrijf heeft deze diversificatie snel weer opgegeven.’
Defares is een eigenzinnige man, daar zijn alle bronnen het wel over eens. ‘Hij trekt zich van niemand iets aan’, zegt een bron. ‘Tijdens vergaderingen overlegt hij rustig met zijn secretaresse over een horloge dat bij de reparateur moet worden opgehaald. Het maakt hem niet uit dat daar mensen van de clearing of andere belangrijke types bij zitten.’
Ook weigert hij zijn vaste gewoonten te onderbreken door de aanwezigheid van anderen. ‘Tijdens een vergadering kwam zijn secretaresse hem een keer om elf uur wat snoepgoed brengen. Hij gaat dat dan rustig opeten zonder dat zijn gasten iets krijgen. Kennelijk krijgt hij op dat tijdstip altijd iets lekkers toegestopt.’
Toch omschrijft iedereen Defares ook als een aardige man met een goed gevoel voor humor. ‘Natuurlijk heeft hij zijn gebruiksaanwijzing’, zegt een van de bronnen, ‘maar die hebben de topmannen van de optiewereld eigenlijk allemaal. In verhouding tot de anderen is hij een van de normaalsten. Ondanks zijn merkwaardigheden staat hij met beide benen op de grond.’
Maatschappelijk betrokken
Ook de maatschappelijke betrokkenheid van Defares wordt geroemd. ‘In de begintijd van zijn bedrijf stimuleerde hij zijn personeel tot het verrichten van goede werken. Zij werden twee dagen per jaar voor dergelijke activiteiten vrijgesteld.’
Verder is Defares betrokken bij de oprichting van de IMC Weekendschool. Deze school verzorgt aanvullend onderwijs voor kinderen uit achtergestelde wijken. ‘Het mooie is dat Defares niet met deze activiteit te koop loopt; op de website van IMC wordt daar geen reclame voor gemaakt. Dan moet hij het hart wel op de goede plaats hebben.’
Maar moderne en hedendaagse kunst is de grootste passie van Rob Defares. Al sinds het begin van de jaren negentig koopt hij werken van onbekende schilders, om die op kantoor te hangen. Ook bezoekt hij regelmatig tentoonstellingen en is hij in december 2009 toegetreden tot de raad van toezicht van het Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.
Copyright (c) 2010 Het Financieele Dagblad
I find it appauling that you people are still talking about VDM, RDD, or anything that has to do with this story. It’s such old and boring news it’s pathetic! I mean, what’s the story here? Seriously, this is stupid and such a waste of time. This site could be used for some good, options traders are not idiots, but instead most often it’s used as a forum to discuss stupidity, and that’s sad.
WE WANT TO SHAPE THE WORLDS FUTURE!!!
APPAULING – what are you talking about. This is still very big news. there was fraud, there was money being embezzled and there was positions sold at discount to a muppett called eggbert who should also be in prison with rdd.
i appauled with you thinking that this should be forgotten about. people still want to see the appropriate action taken on all the above points i mentioned, and this hasnt as yet happened.
if this had happened in the uk (fsa), or the us (sec), people would go to jail for all of the things that have happened. in holland, nothing is done, and thats why the financial markets in the netherlands and the companies that go with it cant be taken seriously.
just wait and see the fine that optiver get in america – then you will see how appropriate action is taken with law breaking in the markets
http://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-tell-if-a-ceo-is-lying-2010-8
By the way……..just heard that All Options (one of our other favourites) has difficulties with cash. There should be enough cash for only 1 year !
Anybody knows more?
1 year? You mean end of the year!
AJ is trying hard to save AO
whtat’s the problem with having a 80 mio euro costing dream.
80 mln? Can you explain?
Add salaries of 200 non result adding staff and inconsiderate IT investments for the last 2-3 years together with this market and you’ll get close
You forget to add the succesfull take over…or take under
saen was a great trading firm! all options really killed it.
I thought Saen had to be rescued bij All options. Money problems and people leaving doesn’t sound like a winner….
on the former floor I liked Accent Grave better!
(also vertical black and white stripes on their trading jackets)
how are they nowadays doing btw??
http://www.accentgroupe.com/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1
i heard saen was bankrupt and allard paid for it. Big time
now he has some nice software, but no traders
now he has crappy software, but all the crappy traders are gone
Allard needs to get himself a new set of directors, people competent in their jobs. Then he will see some progress. Sorry to say this, but it is true, he has too many con artists around him at this moment.
he can’t play puppet master anymore when people are too smart or critical. So don’t count on a new board very soon.
can’t the puppet master just sell his company and retire?!
how much does he have left from the Altana-trade?
Saen a good trading company???are you fucking kiddin me???
There was one good market maker in aex pmm, but the majority was a bunch of slimy ass kissers and cowboy style “I know it all” old school pit traders…there were also some nice people there but damn guaranteed that it was not a good trading company…
sell his company, haha. like that is an option he has. If you are trading you can better hope he keeps on providing liquidity.
who wants to buy the crappy software without the crappy traders anyway
I don’t know how much AJ has still left from the altana deal but I got 1 mio plus for doing nothing. Didn’t even had to pay for the shares in AO.
you’re kidding right…
I mean if so: +kudo’s for you, but are those stories of 24-year olds with Porsches really true?
How many guy’s became millionaire after the Altana-trade??
no more like 28-year olds on average
@ Seasoned HR wanker:
In 2007, when All Options posted a 220m net profit thanks to Altana, only 20m were paid in bonuses. That’s a lousy 8% bonus deal (including management bonuses). Factor in the high Dutch taxes and the size of their staff back then and you’ll understand that few traders raked in enough to call themselves millionaires thanks to Altana.
Of course there are also the AOI shareholders. Post-Altana more than 100m EUR has been distributed in dividends (which is why after continued losses the company is now strapped for cash). So fat chance of any future bonuses for the traders. About 80% of the shares are held by Allard Jakobs. Factor in a few of his buddies from the start-up days, and you’ll realize that there weren’t that many traders at AO who walked away with a 1m+ paycheck thanks to Altana.
So in short, AOI management did well, not the traders. That’s AOI’s definition of “team trading”. I hope this will finally put an end to the question if AO is a good place to work for (as a trader that is).
That’s wrong – what you forget to mention is that all the employees were shareholders. As AO had an equity participation scheme for staff. So they had a double win – bonuses + dividend. Many walked away with very large payouts.
Also, AO was only about 50 employees at the time – Altana helped fund their expansion.
So get your facts right.
Hence, all the All Option-employees who were there at the time are LOADED
@ Dom:
nobody accept from AJ was shareholder. The others had certificates and not everybody had them. The altana trade funded their expansion but didn’t guarantee the proper vision.
So get your facts right
I had my facts damn straight, Dom. Don’t be brainwashed by the “team trading” dcotrine. Yes, some people within made good money on Altana (AJ stands out of course), that is not being debated. The question however was if Altana made many of the AO traders millionaires. The answer is no.
Bonus wise, 20 million pay-out divided across a staff of 50 (with management taking especially good care of themselves), that is an AVERAGE of 200k euro (net of taxes). Not quite my definition of millionaire.
The vast majority of AOI shares were (are) held by AJ and senior management. Some traders held an (indirect) stake. We are talking WELL below 1%. Again, this is basic maths (try splitting less than 10% across a few dozen people). About half of the Altana profit was distributed through dividends, the other half is being lost by continued business. Subtract Dutch dividend tax and a few traders walked out with an additional amount of cash that is still not enough to call themselves millionaires.
BTW, in 2008 – which was a very good year for most trading companies – AO paid out 8 million in bonuses to a staff of 250. I will help Dom do the math: 32k on average. Congrats. Bonus forecast for 2010 and beyond: Z-E-R-O.
@ Gert & Frans, can you elaborate on your, I presume, previous function within all options.
From what I read bottom line seems to be AJ took most of the money, not the traders, and now he is taking care he will lose it very fast. -40mln a year is a lot! How long will/can he keep on going?
Will he play his beloved game, ALL or nothing?
It doesn’t take a genius to figure out which side of the (traders / management) fence I was on 🙂 I have been careful with the information I have provided, in fact it’s all in the public domain (AOI’s 2008 annual report to be precise) and I can handle basic math. Talk about getting your facts straight! The stories I could tell you off the record about AO management (including my favorites Gert & Frans) and “team trading” … maybe some other time. I have moved on.
You’re more then right to move on in your career.
Thank you for your contribution to the discussion!
Are those traders at AO that don’t even make enough to cover the overhead entitled to a huge bonus??
All those traders that are complaining about all options and not getting enough bonusses should blame themselves.
As far as I know all the profit AO made over the last few years is due to a gamble of Allard. If traders at AO were doing what they should do then maybe allard wouldn’t need these gambles to save his company.
It was not about who was deserving of a bonus and who wasn’t. The question was how many traders at AO enjoyed a considerable financial benefit from the Altana trades. I answered that. Plain and simple. Personally I don’t think anyone in HR (for example) was deserving of a bonus, but that was not the point of our discussion.
I will make two remarks. If Allard is solely responsible for the company’s profits, why does he keep a staff of 250? Secondly, if you do make a significant contribution to the P&L, you will barely be rewarded. Remember the concept of “team trading” or have you been brainwashed already into defending it?
Ha, ha, I was commenting on the general trend of atacking AO.
But I agree, Allard doesn’t need 250 people. Especially when they are not contibuting to the profit of the company.
P.s. probably brainwashed. Te lang rondgelopen met het “elke dag een tonnetje” jasje 😉
Allard wil gewoon de allergrootste worden. Zijn grote wraak op Optiver. Ook als dat geld kost. Ik heb ontzettend veel mogen leren van Allaaaar. Groot repect voor de risico’s die hij durft te nemen.
Ook onder deze omstandigheden.
Mee eens (zolang die risico’s mijn netliq maar niet beinvloeden).
Maar ja,jij hebt waarschijnlijk ook nog zo een jasje in de kast hangen 🙂
Vandaag een artikel in FD trouwens over Allard.
Revenge is almost always a bad motivator. At least when it comes to money. Few people outside of our community have even heared of Optiver; chances are the CFTC story was the biggest press Optiver has ever received. So who cares about being bigger than Optiver?
Is Jerry op vakantie ? Ik wil wel weer eens een nieuw artikel lezen !
I agree, we need a new article. But are we sure that Jerry = Trader Jack and not Matthew Hoyle?
all wrong,
trader jack is not jerry de leeuw,
and not matthew hoyle,
but a former trader and one of matthew’s former employees
Sorry folks, was on holiday past weeks and will post a new one shortly.
Jack
Hilarious
Jack – who’s posting under Jerry’s name
everybody is facking everyone
faking/fucking is what I ment 🙂
Aespen on the edge of collapse…..
Please advice
advice yourself
and be open with us, cause almost everyone knows already that they said ‘goodbye’ to Mustapha and Roderick
so tell us something we don’t know yet
Well then Anonymus, let me tell you something that you don’t know yet:
– that Espresso has less caffeine than a cup of coffee?
– and that the human head contains 22 bones?
– and that the mathematical decimal system was introduced in 4BC?
– and not to forget that dinosaurs did not eat grass?
I hope I told you something that you didn’t know Anonymus.
It’s ‘Anonymous’ 🙂
let’s get back to the nice part of this thread, AO.
It seems both dom and gert&frans don’t know exactly what happened. Why all the frustration with AJ if he made everybody and himself big bucks? Can somebody tell what happened?
Are they really going bankrupt after the big altana trade?
… um, not “everybody” made big bucks at AO. Which parts of my posts did you not comprehend? The one where I voiced my opinion that EUR 32k isn’t exactly “big bucks”? (Neither is 200k)
No wait, I understand. You mean to say that a lot of money was made at AO in 2007 on the Altana trades. Absolutely true. So big bucks = big P&L? You choose to ignore the fact that the bonuses were sub-standard. Brainwashed by the “team trading” mentality no doubt.
The real question is: will AJ plough back the money he took out of the company (via the large dividends) in his quest to exact revenge on Optiver. Or will AJ’s “team mentality” draw the line at his personal finances and watch AO go up in flames?
Everyone knows that Jack = Matthew?
Bringing the money back into the company is gonna be a bit difficult I think. Cause isn’t AO under investigation bij the IRS for routing the dividend through AO Curacao?
In a matter of fact, wasn’t AO Curacao founded especially for the €200m out of the Altana-trade??
AO Curacao is one desk with one computer….
Yes the Altana profits were generated within AO Curacao (on paper alone) – that alone saved the company roughly EUR 60 million in corporate taxes.
http://www.linkedin.com/ppl/webprofile?vmi=&id=23384230&pvs=pp&authToken=WW7q&authType=name&locale=en_US&trk=ppro_viewmore&lnk=vw_pprofile
Wist niet dat nolles daar nog zat.
and Patrick as well, who switched from victim to suspect after Altana.
http://www.linkedin.com/profile?viewProfile=&key=2554053¬Contactable=&goback=%2Evpf_23384230_WW7q_name_pp_martijn_nolles_*1_*1_*1_*1
richard = what a clown!
hahahah
guy couldnt run a chip shop in essex without messing it up!
Geez…wat een droevige ellende allemaal. Die brief heb ik eerder gezien van VDM, ongeveer 3 maanden nadat ik getekend had. Wat betreft de competentie van verschillende handelaren, ieder handelshuis heeft zijn eigen talenten aan boord, maar rotte peren zitten er bij alle optiehuizen tussen. Sommige mensen zijn gewoon erg goed in het kussen van de juiste konten.
We zullen zien waar alle partijen staan over 2 jaar. Ik wens de jongens van Caerus en Aespen al het succes toe dat ze ongetwijfeld nodig zullen hebben.
Bij Van der Moolen zaten allemaal prutsers, dat was op de vloer al duidelijk.
Kan iemand de gerusten bevestigen dat bij de Van der Moolen spin-offs WEBB en Alphabay Capital de stekker er al weer uit gaat (moet)?
cud u type in english pls .. the google translator was quite useless in producing an english version of it .. its not even clear what are u asking ?
Snor = moustache 🙂
Snor! Hoe is ie kerel? Toch maar weer terug gekomen naar NL?
Den Drijver is a comedian
he was peddling round turn rates like a true hustler in london in early 2000….
change the blow dry baby…
freddie
he had a lovely way
we could never understand a word he said
no wonder VDM went bust
what a cowboy
Den Derijver ‘road map’ bit like ‘one of the floaters i found in the bog this a,m’
no doubt he was creating deep foundations for the firm
what nonsense
think outside the box
blue sky drizzle
stay in switzerland baby – the SEC has long memories.
Good luck ‘joker’
a man like richard has true brilliance
he talks a lot
and says nothing
he is charming
and reminds me of burt reynolds in y front…
we love you richard
pls come back
they are plenty of retarded stupid people who make it to the top for various reasons, mostly by chance, George W Bush is another such eg from last decade,
that is true in general for all dutch managers at van der moolen. onno, egbert, van der linden, van der eerden, duif, van der berg, harteveld etc. they couldn’t trade themselves out of a wet paper bag if their lives depended on it. horrible horrible (wanne-be) traders who had no clue how the business was to be run yet they had been moved up to management positions. simply because they did everything richard asked them to do, no matter how stupid, illegal or unethical and never criticized him to protect their overpaid jobs. well, except for a spineless one or two who started complaining abt richard immediately after the company blew up. they are as much to blame as richard.
wanna-be traders is a good way to put it, eggbert is a smart guy, but markets are little bit smarter for him, some of the things he did would lead anyone scratching their head,
Onno: more or less fired by Den Drijver when he stopped taking orders and started critizising Hans Kroon. Presently a stay-at-home dad while his wife earns the bread.
Egbert: sells bread / cookies.
Van Der Linden: missing in action.
Van De Eerden: who is this guy and does anyone care?
Duif: kicked out by Den Drijver, it’s not fair to compare him with the others because Duif was a successfull trader in the past.
Van Der Berg: Mr Online Trader was fired by Den Drijver. Marco is *extremely* succesful with his new company Web Traders that nobody has heard off.
Jaap Harteveld: struggling at Effective Traders.
We know they all sucked and only an idiot like Den Drijver would hire them. Can we move on to the next topic please?
Sorry, but I believe all former Curvalue traders will agree Egbert Pronk was a good trader. On the screen for sure.
@ 5:23 pm
Hallo Egbert, leuk weer eens wat van je te lezen. Prettige Paasdagen!
Eggbert was trying to trade AEX Options, with actual quotes, without the electronic eye, yah good trader on screen, for sure,
what’s this ‘electronic eye’ ?? we didn’t have that in the pit.
yah you should go back to selling bread and cookie in the pit, wait aren’t you doing that already, smart fella,
Off topic: Retard of the day, Joe Gawronski.
“Forex and fixed income broadly speaking are of great interest and folks continue to try to figure out how to play in options as well,” he said. Options, he added, tend to be a challenge for the HFTs because of the differences in liquidity relative to U.S. equities, which means they require on average longer holding periods and thus greater risk tolerance than HFTs are used to in equities.
http://www.tradersmagazine.com/news/hft-profitability-assets-geography-109876-1.html
what is so retarded in what he is talking about ?
I think everyone would agree that all curvalue traders on the floor were clueless, especially the 3 in the index pit.
aren’t the good ones off them now working quite okay with cearus>?
allemaal afgunst. in de goede jaren (1999-2002) verdiende curvalue tussen de 2 en 6 ton euro per jaar. en dat met maar een man of 25. dat wordt nog wel eens stilgezwegen. feit blijft dat het geld er gewoon uitspoot bij curvalue en dat natuurlijk kan niet zonder tophandelaren en topmanagers. of denk je soms dat vdm een bak geld zou betalen voor een kat in de zak? ik dacht het niet!
In een goed jaar tussen de 2 en 6 ton, oftewel tussen de 8000 en 24000 per handelaar? En dat noem je een goed jaar?
I would guess its 2 to 6 ton per trader, even a blind dog would have made money in that period,
Het was 2 tot 6 meloen, na bonussen en alle andere kosten
This Evert guy is right. When VDM took over Curvalue, Fred Böttcher gave a presentation on Curvalue and displayed their detailed earnings. Their best year was 2000 when the company made just shy of 1 million euros. With a bit of luck you can still find the slides of the presentation somewhere on the internet. One of the many reasons why everyone was scratching their heads when VDM took over that shitty company.
Why are these ex-Curvalue guys always trying to pretend they were in any way successful??????
@ 4:05 pm: dat geloof je toch zeker zelf niet? het eerste dat werd gedaan door vdm, nog voordat de overname formeel plaatsvond, was 5 miljoen euro pompen in curvalue (lening) omdat ze hard geld nodig hadden om te handelen. niet erg aannemelijk dat je alle jaren daarvoor 2 tot 6 miljoen bijschreef (per jaar).
Aan de Nieuwezijds waren de kosten van Curvalue niet zo hoog. De WCs zagen er beter uit dan de handelsplekken.
@ 4:05 pm: that faith you surely do not? the first thing that was done by VDM, even before the formal takeover took place, 5 million pumps in curvalue (loan) because they needed money fast to act. not very likely that all previous years from 2 to 6,000,000 bijschreef (per year).
The cost of Curvalue Nieuwezijds were not so high. The toilets looked better than the commercial spots.
“The overhead of the Curvalue operations at the Nieuwezijds location wasn’t high. The toilets looked better than the trading desks.”
what figure is that 1 million, is it gross trading revenues, or minus trading expenses or minus bonuses or just the dividend to the shareholders that year,
As usual: the company’s net profit, after expenses (including salaries, bonuses and taxes). The company retained its pitiful earnings.
i think there were lots of envelopes being passed under the table when curvalue was sold to vdm. it wasnt bought for the trading systems (they had nothing proprietary) and it definitely wasnt bought for the muppett traders like egbert and mark in the aex pit.
Stop spreading lies. ClickStation was the best software you could have wished for and years ahead of the competition. And don’t forget that first and foremost VDM bought Curvalue to acquire Online Trader which turned out to be an even bigger success.
50 years from now, people will look back and pay Den Drijver the respect he so deserves.
is Mark the guy people people called `plofkop`?
limbo and co
if 1 million is after compensation, the gross revenues could be lot higher, specially if the traders are taking bonus rather than dividends as partners,
vdm paid 50mil for curvalue ?
@12:32am You don’t really believe the company paid out 90+% of its net trading profits in the form of trader bonuses do you?
Bottom line: their earnings were pitiful. Before bonuses, taxes, you name it. That’s why you had never heard of Curvalue before the takeover. And that’s why you haven’t heard from those guys after VDM went up in flames.
Selling the company to VDM was the only good trade Curvalue ever did.
That trade should have been busted since it was clearly outside of reasonable barriers.
if you don’t believe 90%, what do you think are the numbers for Gross Trading Revenue, Costs, Trader’s Bonus, Capital/Shares Held, Net profit/dividends to them, this last number is speculated to be 1 mil ?
Stop whining about dividends and Capital/Shares and such. Gross trading revenue is a nonsensical number. For example, for many pure HFT firms, their transaction fees eat up a substantial part of their gross trading profits.
The first thing you want to look at is the net trading result. This is how much you make buying and selling securities as you went along, after you subtracted the transaction costs, clearing expenses, interest charges, you name it.
On top of that, you have additional overhead costs. Nowadays: the infrastructure, the office you are renting, the accountant who’s doing your books and so on. Back in 2000, Curvalue was trading in the pit, meaning their overhead was quite low. No data centers, no dozens of developers.
Furthermore, you are paying your staff and traders salaries and (hopefully) bonuses. Obviously if you are paying 90% bonuses, not a lot will be left for the shareholders. This wasn’t the case at Curvalue, where bonus payments were in fact around 40%.
After you deducted these expenses, then the taxman wants some of your profits. (Around 25% in Holland, in the case of Curvalue).
The final number is the net profit for the company. The company may decide to pay out a dividend, but it has no impact on the net profit. Please ignore dividends, they don’t factor into this equation.
For Curvalue, in the company’s best years, the company’s net profit was between 200k and 600k. With 25 traders, that is pitiful. Between 8k and 25k in profits left for the company in a good year. It’s a nice number for a company such as WalMart that employs 2 million people, but for a small trading firm, certainly nowadays with substantial fixed costs, it is not a viable basis going forward. Again … in their best years.
We can also work our way back. Let’s say 400k profit after tax, comes to about 550k pre-tax. Assuming a 40% bonus deal, that means that the net trading result minus overhead was 1.4 million. As I explained, their overhead was quite low in the days of pit trading. Factor in the salaries (not excessive at Curvalue), and their pit traders were generating net trading profits of around 150k each per year. Traders at contemporary rivals such as Optiver and AOT were making hundreds of k each.
Days of pit trading … spreads that were a mile wide … 600 euros pnl per day.
Fail.
Curvalue also had a few dozen Bund traders … they make the Curvalue option traders look like masters of the universe, if you can believe that!
@como es Juan
I want to believe
all your long winded explanation abt trading revenues and costs can be understood by anyone with half brain reading my earlier one liner, has somebody ever told you that you use too many words to explain yourself
the dividends factors in very heavily in partnership structure where there is tax arbitrage between income and dividend, stop with your half laid understanding and preachy layout,
your calculation is incorrect when you make 550k/0.4 = 1.4mil, it should be 550k/0.6 = 900k, the 550k should be after trader comp, that is 40%
Also 40% is trader comp, so trader salary would not be factored in another time when estimating overheads and getting net trading profits,
ex-curvalue here ( only briefly godzijdank) to settle the argument
you don’t seem to know anything about curvalue. richard owned nearly all of the shares. not much of a partnership if all decisions are being made by and for one person only
when you say salaries were included in the 40% or you correct the other guy’s :0.4 mistake, it only drives down the “”net trading result”” of the company, meaning the traders made even less money than the other guy said. so what’s your point again?!
as for your tax assumptions, if you actually had any knowledge about the dutch fiscal system, you’d know that company tax + dividend tax have always been lower than income tax in holland UNLESS you are talking about really small amounts of money (less than 100k).
so if your talking about substantial profits that needed to be tax optimized retained earnings + dividend would have been the way to go. so the reported earnings would accurately reflect the actual profits of the company. meaning they were very low
don’t forget that vdm’s 45 million euro valuation of curvalue included 20 million (goodwill) for online trader, another 15 million goodwill for pmm licenses and their useless software that they didn’t even own etcetra. subtract the remaining equity that was there in 2005, and it leaves about 5 million euro’s equalling the company’s earnings multiplied by whatever P/E ratio that vdm paid. now it’s your turn again to pretend that curvalue was making millions a year but that vdm offered a P/E below 1 for their market making.
youre an idiot. you would have fit in nicely.
what argument? the above was a discussion about what were the possible numbers on the curvalue income statement,
of course little is known, that’s why there were guesses being made of what was actually happening on the ground, you seem to know more, so enlighten the rest,
again, this is just one guess about whether trader salary is included in 40% or not, can u tell if 40% is comp or bonus?
the dutch tax system is hard to figure for non-dutch speakers, so have no expertise on it, but in absence of no outside help, starting with some assumption is better than not trying to think at all, it seems from your input that tax arbitrage is indeed for real when it comes to income vs dividend as was the original assumption, and that dividend is preferred tax treatment much like in US,
what are you going on about ‘it’s your turn’ and ‘you would have fit’, it reminds me of small dick syndrome and coming from curvegen, you do fit in well,
Why would you care anyway as foreigner? This industry has seen many uneducated guys making a lot of money because they had an instinct (so called boerenverstand). The transition to screen trading and also the tightening of tax rules has changed the profile: one trick ponies and potatoheads have a smaller chance of being successful. Be happy for the guys that created great personal wealth in the 90’s and early 00’s. Most of them will be down to the ground before the end 2015 anyway…
you were off-base guessing about the curvalue numbers in the first place
curvalue’s numbers are public, quite detailed and of course they have been scrutinized (at optiver we always try to get as much info as we can on our competitors, small and large) ……. meaning: few guesses have to be made ……. if you are not familiar with the dutch tax system or ducth accounting standards, that’s ok, just don’t make up silly assumptions, first read up and do some research before you write something stupid
History has many valuable lessons, and those are much cheaper than learning off your first hand experience, doesn’t matter if the history in question is of Holland, its of course the land of first and most outlandish super bubble, that of Tulip, should people not be interested in that if they are foreigners,
If the curvalue numbers are public, do you have the weblink to it, or if somebody wants to take the effort of searching off Google,
The assumptions can be silly, there’s nothing wrong with being incorrect if you are willing to accept the mistake, you seem to have done reading up and research etc, if you want to write something knowledgeable, then pls do so, other wise just fcuk off, wrong assumption is much better than no assumption, have they taught you that at Optiver,
Ik zeg opbokken met die uitvreter!
say that with opbokken uitvreter!