FOW event coming up

92 comments / March 10, 2014

Future & Options World, FOW for friends, will be having their annual event again in Amsterdam on March 25th. This time the event will be held in the Hilton.

On the agenda a discussion about the microwave connectivity (which is a waste of resources imho), exchange competition (yes, with TOM) and Mifid II.

Another interesting discussion will be held about the next opportunity for market makers, which is a round up of usual suspects in the panel : Hans Pieterse (Optiver), Remco Lenterman (IMC) and Marco van den Berg (Webbtraders).

At the end of the day there's a gala dinner and charity auction at barretje Hilton. Charity goes to Emma Kinderziekenhuis and Alzheimer's Society. To book your place at the dinner you can contact Ferry Boekholt. Tickets for the FOW Event are basically free for traders and brokers.

Full agenda : pdf

Jump gives $25 million to medical research

102 comments / March 2, 2014

A sharp contrast with the small struggling firm mentioned here last week. The Chicago headquartered high frequency trading shop Jump Trading is still kicking it.

Unsure about their exact profits, but it must be enough to fund $25 million to a medical research project.

To give a sense of proportion ; the Dutch market maker Optiver makes a yearly profit of around 150 million.

Profit 1.900, penalty 50.000

52 comments / February 25, 2014

The Dutch watchdog for financial markets, the AFM, strikes again.

Accent Grave has been fined for manipulating the market in the penny stock NedSense in August 2010. Daytrading shop Accent Grave earned EUR 1900 with “pump and dump” trades, and are fined with EUR 50.000.

Changing last traded

In short, the trader bought 18k of these shares at 40 cent in the opening. During the day he traded a few back and forth. In two days he made 1878 euro before costs. The problem in the eyes of the AFM is this ; he bought twice a very small amount (say, 100 shares) at the offer. So the last traded price changed.

In the view of the AFM the last traded price is the value of a stock. That’s a little old fashioned. Especially in very illiquid penny stocks the only thing matters is at what level you can get out of your position. The midprice is a better indication.

Anyway, the arguments between the AFM and Accent Grave are in this pdf (nl). See page 3 for an overview of the trades. What Accent Grave could have said was “these small trades were only executed to check for iceberg orders“.

Two years investigation

My sympathy is with the ~~struggling~~ modest trading shop. A fine of 50k is way out of proportion, especially for this innocent kind of manual trading. It’s not like they’re hurting the integrity of the markets. Perhaps the AFM staff should try to trade stocks for a few days, to get a grasp of the real trading world.

It has taken the AFM more than two years to end this case, and as requested by Accent Grave / Circonflexe the decision has been kept silent until this month.

Brainstorm for movie title

66 comments / February 23, 2014

Few months ago had a coffee with the director of a new movie about a Dutch rogue trader. As a graduation project of the filmacademie, the guys worked with limited budget. Everything is more or less finished, just some last editing left.

The main thing still missing is a catchy title. There are some suggestions, but they aren’t very convincing. The story is about a rogue trader who has a day or two before the police will arrest him – and spends his time meeting old friends. Say, the The 25th Hour but this time instead of the drug dealer the trader who’s facing jail. Not much dealingroom footage, but a financial term could be nice. Say ; margin call.

Director Tom van Blommenstein coined “Dead cat bounce“. A Dutch title is possible too – there won’t be any subtitles from the start. Anybody a better suggestion?

Den Drijver and Kroon wanted. Again.

1 comment / February 16, 2014

It has been a while since the VEB and insurer ASR launched a quest for the location of Richard den Drijver, his companion Hans Kroon and McNally.

The liquidators of Van der Moolen finally join in (link – nl). Both Richard den D. and Hans K. are told a court case against them will kick off on May 14th, 10:00 AM at the Parnassusweg in Amsterdam.

Kroon is in Monaco, and Den Drijver could be living in his apartment in Hyde Park, in New York (Queens), Switzerland or Morocco. As the legal advisor for the VEB already told followthemoney (nl), they won’t mind chasing them for a decade. They have incredible patience.

Amsterdamtrader