This weeks piccie:
This weeks piccie was going to be:
NYSE’s 85 million spend is staggering.
ICE’s High Frequency Messaging model gives hope to ‘user pays’ and recognizes context and quality.
ESMA publish HFT guidelines.
UK Government release draft Foresight report. Yes, HFT have breached an important speed limit. But so too, do cars. Just because cars move faster than I can run, does that make them a bad thing? If a HFT is faster than a hand signal, is that a bad thing?
(The second link on this paper – below – also provides access to all the background materials – so you can draw your own conclusions rather than relying on the authors views).
IOSCO recommendations for OTC clearing are out.
Looks like all the Aussie legal firms are changing names.
Wow, less than 150 days to go to the Olympics and England’s hopes being crushed at London 2012.
Everything you need to know about 2012 here:
Happily survived the TamaCloey Cliffside Odyssey.
Results are up here:
This is a great point to point / journey swim.
Tamarama is famed for it’s Grey Nurses, once considered a man eater.
The Grey Nurse conservation area is actually a couple of miles further down the coast.
That said, the TamaCloey swim is right over an Aquatic reserve, taking in Shark Point.
This Sundee it’s off to Freshwater.
This weeks super15 rounds.
And the 6 nations? France this weeks predictable winner.
Whatever your leisure, make it a pleasure.
Have a great w/end all.
S
PLATFORMS
MAPLE EXTENDS TMX GROUP OFFER DEADLINE
Maple Group Acquisition Corporation ("Maple"), a corporation whose investors comprise 13 of Canada's leading financial institutions and pension funds, and TMX Group Inc. (TSX: X) today announced the extension of Maple's offer to acquire a minimum of 70% and a maximum of 80% of the shares of TMX Group to 5:00 p.m. (Eastern Time) on March 30, 2012, unless further extended or withdrawn.
DB DEAL FAILURE COST NYSE $85 MILLION
ICE's High Frequency Messaging Policy
"Before 2011, ICE's messaging policy, like many other exchanges, was a simple order-to-trade ratio with published benchmarks above which high frequency traders were assessed a fee," said Mark Wassersug, Vice President of Operations. "However, this simplistic approach didn't differentiate between orders that 'added to liquidity' and those that were far out of the market. Our HFT Messaging Policy directly addressed this problem by overweighting orders far away from the market relative to those orders near the best bid or offer at the time of entry. The ratio of orders using the weighting scale to lots traded is called the Weighted Volume Ratio (WVR). Traders exceeding our WVR benchmark incur a fee and fees increase as higher WVR thresholds are exceeded. This framework has been extremely successful in managing the high frequency traders in our markets.
CLEARING
SIX GROUP TO CUT 150 JOBS
Blaming a "difficult market environment", Swiss financial services company SIX Group says it will axe 150 jobs as part of a SFr30 million cost-cutting programme.
BURSA MALAYSIA GOES LIVE WITH NEW DERIVATIVES CLEARING AND SETTLEMENT SYSTEM
POLICY
European authorities get two months to affirm HFT governance plans
ESMA today publishes the official translations of its final “Guidelines on systems and controls in an automated trading environment for trading platforms, investment firms and competent authorities” (ESMA/2011/456)
By having translated the guidelines into all the official languages of the EU, today’s publication triggers a transitional period of two months within which national supervisors have to declare whether they intend to comply with the guidelines
The Future of Computer Trading in Financial Markets: Working paper
Paper 1: Financial stability and computer based trading
Markets with significant proportions of computer based high frequency traders are a recent phenomenon. One of the most novel aspects of their
dynamics is that interactions take place at a pace where human intervention could not prevent them, and in that sense an important speed limit has been breached.
Paper 2: The impact of computer trading on liquidity, price efficiency/discovery and transaction costs
The nature of market making has changed, shifting from designated providers to opportunistic traders. High frequency traders now provide the
bulk of liquidity, but their use of limited capital combined with ultra-fast speed creates the potential for periodic illiquidity.
Paper 3: The impact of technology developments
Today’s markets involve human traders interacting with large numbers of robot trading systems, yet there is very little scientific understanding of how such markets can behave.
The working paper provides an expert, independent review of the emerging evidence base on computer trading, rather than being Foresight’s findings or conclusions on these issues. The findings do not represent the position of the UK or any other government.
*** This is the better of the 2 links.
IOSCO makes recommendations on OTC derivative mandatory clearing
** Press Release w/ summary of 17 recommendations
Requirements for Mandatory Clearing
** Full 47 page paper.
IOSCO News Releases
Financial Services Authority Transaction Reporting User Pack (TRUP)
PARTICIPANTS
Q&A with Getco's new CEO Coleman: WSJ
Chicago-based Getco LLC appointed Daniel Coleman chief executive on Monday, putting the former UBS equities boss in charge of a major force in electronic trading as Getco seeks to offer its market expertise to investment funds and other financial institutions.
Coleman and co-founder Stephen Schuler answered questions about the new direction for Getco
WEDBUSH LAUNCHES EXECUTION SOLUTIONS GROUP
RBS signs MOU for sale of Asian assets
Malaysia's number two lender, CIMB Group Holdings Bhd has announced a memorandum of understanding with the Royal Bank of Scotland.
CBA's ATM network fails
The outage comes barely a week after the Reserve Bank of Australia took issue with technology failures at the nation’s banks, saying it plans to “formalise” tougher rules for reporting any glitches with electronic payment systems.
We are now King & Wood Mallesons
King & Wood and Mallesons Stephen Jaques have come together, from March 1st, 2012,
Blah, blah...Sharing a history of bold innovation and a vision to create a global law firm in Asia ...
Ashurst and Blake Dawson have announced plans to combine their businesses in Asia and merge their operations globally, creating a new and powerful legal presence in the international market under the Ashurst name.
Ashurst - key facts
- Number of partners: 229
- Total number of lawyers: 915
- Office locations: Abu Dhabi, Brussels, Dubai, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, London, Madrid, Milan, Munich, New York, Paris, Rome, Singapore, Stockholm, Tokyo, Washington DC.
- Revenue 2011: £303 million / AUS$462 million
Blake Dawson - key facts
- Number of partners: 192
- Total number of lawyers: 828
- Office locations: Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne, Perth, Sydney, Shanghai, Singapore, Port Moresby, Tokyo and an associated office in Jakarta
- Revenue 2011: AUS$380 million / £250 million
