Goldman Suspends 4 Senior Tech Specialists After Trading Glitch 140
First time accepted submitter sbjornda writes "A glitch in an internal system led to erroneous trades on some funds whose listings begin with the letters H through L. Goldman Sachs has put four Senior Technology Specialists on administrative leave as a result. From the article: 'The system, called a "trading axis," monitors the Wall Street bank's inventory to determine whether it should be a more aggressive buyer or seller in the market. But a technical error misinterpreted non-binding indications of interest, or IOIs, as firm bids and offers, leading to some trades that were vastly out of line with where market prices were, Reuters reported previously, citing a source familiar with the matter.'"
Let me get this straight (Score:3, Insightful)
Some high profile companies/people fucked up and lost money, so the market shut down.
Why didn't it shut down when I lost money in the stock market? Oh right, $1500 isn't enough for me to matter.
I'm sure I'm wrong on this. Someone correct me!
Tokens. (Score:4, Insightful)
The disgusting criminals at the top sacrificing a few pawns.
Re:Let me get this straight (Score:5, Insightful)
Some high profile companies/people fucked up and lost money, so the market shut down.
Why didn't it shut down when I lost money in the stock market? Oh right, $1500 isn't enough for me to matter.
I'm sure I'm wrong on this. Someone correct me!
When your loss can trigger a sell wave, they'll shut the market down to investigate. The market wasn't shut down because GS lost money, but because something was obviously systematically wrong, and they wanted to figure out what it was before allowing more trades. Once they found out what it was, they could have brought everything back up, as it was just a bad algorithm used by a single (large) trader.
it's kind of like if you get hit with a pebble vs hearing a loud rumbling sound and getting pelted with pebbles -- you're more likely to vacate the area and then investigate in the second instance, even if it's the same monkey hitting you with multiple pebbles.
Blame the IT guy (Score:5, Insightful)
Just another example of "blame the IT guy".
If it breaks, you don't fire the trader, the lawyer, CEO, VP, whoever. If you lose a billion dollars you don't jail Jon Corzine. If you gamble people's money, you get a golden parachute.
But if you're an IT guy, everything better be perfect, otherwise you'll get fired (lucky) or sent to jail (unlucky).
Re:administrative leave? (Score:4, Insightful)
Do these guys have contracts or something? Most of us are at-will hires. We don't get administrative leave, we get fired. Could also be that they have specialized knowledge and they are going to give them cash when they leave in exchange for transferring knowledge. The only time I have heard of 'administrative leave' is with government/union people. With at-will employment, you can be fired just because management feels like it.
As much as we love to bash big banking for looking at anyone not a pyschopath trader as a cost center, they need top talent.
Basically other slashdotters who work on these systems are on demands to change whole algorithms of the system within the hour by the traders whim with no QA, GET IT OUT FAST, but whoa if has a bug! You can't negotiate with these kinds of people who in their opinion generate real money and view themselves as supperior.
But they are not stupid and realize such great demands require a 6 figure salary, plus a bonus, plus being selective on a contract that the programmer will find more favorable. If they all said $12/hr take it or leave it and fire at will they will get crappy talent that could sink them fast. So the programmers here know the drill and the lack of job security so they negotiate it in a contract.
If you are in a job where your employer treats you like this then you are not valuable. Not to mean to insult as we all started out this way until we had to prove ourselves and or get a skill that made us more rare. Go find another employer who values your skills more if you have the experience by now or go do something about your skillset? Capitalism 101, both buyers and sellers will always take advantage of a weakness. If there are 10 folks begigng your job then your employer can do whatever the fuck he wants. If there are 10 jobs and you are the only one qualified, then you exploit the employers by walking if they do not offer you 6 figure salary, bonuses, own office etc.
Re:Let me get this straight (Score:5, Insightful)
And it just happens that it provides a great way for the 1% to remain the 1% while bleeding everyone else dry.
It's a good argument for not allowing any legal fiction to be too big to fail (or jail).
Some are more equal than others. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Blame the IT guy (Score:5, Insightful)
I had an uncle that tried to do that. Turned out that his physics degree was so esoteric that he had trouble finding a job.
He ended up being a produce clerk.
Re:Let me get this straight (Score:2, Insightful)
Err... NO. If Goldman had a computer glitch that caused erroneous trades, that's their fault and they should lose money for that and the market SHOULD go down, and trigger sell waves or whatever. Nobody else gets do-overs, neither should Goldman.
Re:Are they pawns or are they the devs behind bug? (Score:5, Insightful)
The disgusting criminals at the top sacrificing a few pawns.
Are they pawns or are they the developers responsible for the bug? Given the extremely high salaries devs working for wall street receive, didn't you think that there was a catch. i.e. if there is a bug that causes significant embarrassment or a significant loss of money you get fired.
If so the proceeding would seem fair. You want to name your price then your performance better be damn near flawless.
If you're a CEO and you get fired, they'll often pay you more to go away than most people will make in their entire lifetime. For example, Mattel had a loser CEO who managed to make their stock worth half of what it had been. His punishment? Well, he got fired. And paid $25million.
This whole idea that the C-level guys are somehow "earning" those massive benefits by being superhuman beings needs to die, be decapitated, have a stake driven through it, burned and scattered to the winds.
A good worker is valuable, no question. But there's an old management aphorism about what you're supposed to do to irreplaceable people. The reason they get away with it has less to do with the scarcity of their talents than it does with the fact that they have one of the tightest unions around.
Re:OT? (Score:4, Insightful)
"When large numbers of investors trade mutual funds in lockstep, it can force fund managers to buy and sell securities at inopportune times. They may have to find securities to buy in a hurry if the pack invests all at once, and may have to sell quickly to pay off sellers who cash out together."
Right...because when an average investor buys and sell securities at an inopportune time, it's totally cool, but when a fund manager has to do it....well, we can't have that.
Love this world to death: it has so many laws, so many rules, for so many different peoples, and they're all different! No two people abide by the same set of rules. God Himself would be proud.
Re:Are they pawns or are they the devs behind bug? (Score:4, Insightful)
A CEO of large corporation is a professional entertainer. And just like a professional athlete, rock star, or top-billing Hollywood star, they get paid absurd amounts (actually, about the same as those) because people compete to hire them. Hollywood stars are probably the best comparison: few people can do the job, but still plenty more than there are jobs. But stars have followings, and their names bring credibility that helps projects get funding.