Sweet mother of unholy market blowouts..

[Grieve]

My take is there is no way the European central bank is going to let the euro die. Greece will not fall. I think we will hear some dramatic news tonight when we are sleeping and tomorrow and or Monday are going to be massive rallies.

Helluva prediction, Maul.

[Dustie]

My take is there is no way the European central bank is going to let the euro die. Greece will not fall. I think we will hear some dramatic news tonight when we are sleeping and tomorrow and or Monday are going to be massive rallies.

Helluva prediction, Maul.

Perhaps this confirms what I've always suspected about Maul.

Maul is actually

[Jakensama]

Maull has a hot (for an old broad) wife then.

[Vanraw]

Le chat est sorti du sac.

[Vanraw]

I will say that one of the things that really pisses me off about our "insider institutional" trading system, is that graphs like this show that the market is manipulated. The average trader could not jump into this move today when others did over the weekend with befor and after hours trading.

The massive gaps up and down before trading day, are (and have always been for me) indication of market manipulation and not actual company performance. Like Dusty said above. Some people made a lot of money from last week and this weekends market moves. While the average invester just looks and says, wait... How do I buy into this move? Answer, unless you bought Friday during hours, you cant. At least not most people.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&chvs=maximized&chdeh=0&chfdeh=0&chdet=1273521600000&chddm=2523&chls=IntervalBasedLine&q=INDEXDJX:.DJI&ntsp=0">http://www.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&c ... DJI&ntsp=0</a><!-- m -->

[Dustie]

I guess the problem is that a stock like Ford or Protor and Gamble is traded all around the world so the trading never really stops or breaks up into discrete chunks. Something I never really understood until my brother started working at Nasdaq is that a stock like PG could have more trading volume occur outside the NYSE then inside. The end lots end up "clearing" against the NYSE, but most of the electronic trading for PG occurs on Nasdaq exchanges and they "clear" at intervals with NYSE. Its probably the same for other global exchanges (I don't know for sure).

I think it will lead to 24x7 markets eventually since we're essentially there now, we just don't see that smooth curve in the graph because our graphing calculator was turned off while we slept. Of course, traders don't like to go to bed knowing that they could loose everything over night so they want their definite cut off time. But as the chart shows, trading is never really cut off at all.

P.S. to Maul: I think you Merkel did a great job straitening things out over the weekend (and yes, your wife is hot -- duh Jake).

[Vanraw]

yea, I get the whole foreign market aspect of there business. But I'm a bit of a pessimist here since most of the big brokerage companies manage the trading in all the global markets. I think they manage and manipulate profits.

I guarantee you the DOW gap up by 390 points prior to NYSE open wasn't all foreign markets. Big institutional investors and bankers make allot of money before the market was available to average Joes. .

[Jakensama]

Working where I am now has really made me get a grip on the international market, shipping wise. Essentially my workday is - mornings, asia; early afternoon - europe; late afternoon/evening - usa. Seeing the vast swings that can occur during this period in shipping and bunker (fuel) markets during such a short period makes me understand how these swings in the much more volatile paper markets occur.

The 9/5 trading floor is a thing of the past. Our industry has had to adapt to the information age where we are pretty much on call/have someone on desk 24/7, I can't imagine the paper markets can hold on to the stone age forever either.

P.S. to Maul: I think you Merkel did a great job straitening things out over the weekend (and yes, your wife is hot -- duh Jake).

Please never use the words Merkel and hot in the same sentence.. Fette ossi sau..

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/feb/06/angela-merkel-barbie-doll">http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/fe ... arbie-doll</a><!-- m -->

although her barbie doll is pretty idealized... Realistically it would have been a hamster with a wig.

[Grieve]

"And lo, so it came to pass that the traders did look up from their screens in the midst of their panic, and verily did they see a Black Swan flying serenely yonder high above them..."

http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/who...%5Edji,bcs

[Breand]

Goldman Has Zero Trading Loss Days In Last Quarter.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.zerohedge.com/article/unfuckingbelievable-goldman-has-zero-trading-loss-days-last-quarter">http://www.zerohedge.com/article/unfuck ... st-quarter</a><!-- m -->

Imagine that. for 63 days Goldman did not have a single day where their trading lost them money. The possibility of that happening cannot be quantified, i.e. they had to have gamed the system somehow.

[Vanraw]

Goldman Has Zero Trading Loss Days In Last Quarter.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.zerohedge.com/article/unfuckingbelievable-goldman-has-zero-trading-loss-days-last-quarter">http://www.zerohedge.com/article/unfuck ... st-quarter</a><!-- m -->

Imagine that. for 63 days Goldman did not have a single day where their trading lost them money. The possibility of that happening cannot be quantified, i.e. they had to have gamed the system somehow.

Goldman is now the market - or, in keeping with modern market reality, Goldman is the house, it controls the casino, and always wins. Congratulations America: you now have far, far better odds in Las Vegas that you have making money with your E-Trade account.

And they are not the only ones.

[Zephyrs]

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/12697/64868">http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/12697/64868</a><!-- m -->

Making money everyday for a quarter is easy when they are taking the bailout money you gave them and lending it back to the government with interest.

"In one of the most common maneuvers, they simply took the money they borrowed from the government at zero percent and lent it back to the government by buying Treasury bills that paid interest of three or four percent. It was basically a license to print money — no different than attaching an ATM to the side of the Federal Reserve."

[Dustie]

Making money everyday for a quarter is easy when they are taking the bailout money you gave them and lending it back to the government with interest.

The bailout money was not interest free, banks had to pay 5-7% on that money (usually in the form of perferred stock dividends). The free money talked about in the article was the money lent via the normal process of the central bank lending to the money center banks with low rates i.e. 0 to .25% (which incidentally is still available today).

[Zephyrs]

I guess I worded it incorrectly by saying bailout money, the TARP money does have some interest attached but it doesn't take away from the scam they are pulling borrowing money at essentially 0% then loaning it to the government via purchasing treasuries at 3%

Its the second scam the banks are pulling on the government in that article " CON #2 THE DOLLAR STORE " on page 3.
the whole article is worth a read though

[Breand]

I like Matt Taibbi's stuff generally, but I'd take him a lot more seriously if he didn't feel the need to write "fuck" once a paragraph.