Our sister publication, Treasury & Risk, selected the top 100 people in finance in its June issue. As this list never gets old, we thought they wouldn’t mind us sharing the results. Also in that issue is an interview with Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), which is a decidedly different take on TARP than Futures’ interview with former FDIC Chairman Bill Isaac in the July issue.
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Who are the top 100 people in finance?
Thursday, July 1st, 2010When is an obligation not an obligation?
Thursday, June 3rd, 2010The investigation of the May 6 “flash crash” is centering on the concept of stub quotes. This is a relatively new practice that allows designated market makers (specialists) to technically meet their obligation to provide two-sided markets without actually doing it.
We noted on this page earlier that markets makers had appeared to disappear during the extreme move on May 6.
A whistleblower ponders May 6
Tuesday, May 25th, 2010Sherron Watkins is famous for her memo about Enron’s questionable accounting. Her whistleblower status in helping call out the Enron bad boys is part of the legendary fall of the firm. This morning she spoke on a corporate governance panel at InsideCounsel’s Super Conference being held in Chicago. After her panel - in which she ended her remarks stating that if your CEO doesn’t love the company product, workers, business or industry, leave the firm - we sat down to discuss some thoughts on Enron, the markets and why she brings a healthy skepticism to the business. (more…)
Have the mighty fallen?
Wednesday, April 21st, 2010On the heels of putting up the new Futuresmag.com Poll Question, which asks who will win the Goldman Sachs/SEC smack down , I received results from a survey done by the Argyle Executive Forum, a firm that holds leadership conferences for senior executives, asking a similar question to their clients. I found Argyle’s survey results, especially with its clientele, a bit surprising. The question was:
CFOs and Risk Managers fight Washington
Wednesday, April 7th, 2010Treasury & Risk Management’s April issue focused on what corporate treasurers are doing to hold off regulation of OTC products they use. Click here for story.
From Washington: Get ready, new regs coming
Friday, February 26th, 2010Yesterday, we spoke with CFTC and Congress about how new regulation coming out of Washington would affect traders. We also sat down with former CFTC Chair Sharon Brown-Hruska, now a vice president in NERA’s securities and finance practice. Brown-Hruska says that while it’s justified for the CFTC to crack down on illegal forex operations, the agency’s current proposal to limit leverage in OTC forex to 10:1 “overshoots the mark.”
Make sense of this
Thursday, December 17th, 2009Today I saw the following two headlines: “Bank Sees Economic Link Between Commodity Prices” and “Speculation and Speculators don’t cause oil price swings.”
Oddly enough both stories were citing the same study produced by analysts with JP Morgan.
Ben, put your rep where your mouth is
Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009By now you have all heard that Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke said that the recession is probably over following a speech last week.
Those words probably don’t mean a lot to those who have lost their jobs or those who will soon lose their jobs as the economy continues to shed jobs, albeit at a slower pace than in the heart of this recession.
Ten bid on two — $2 trillion that is
Tuesday, August 11th, 2009The Financial Times reported today that the Federal Reserve Bank of New York is “aggressively hiring traders” to manage its growing securities portfolio.
The New York Fed implements the Fed’s monetary policy and according to the FT plans to increase the staff in its markets group to 400 by yearend. That is up from 240 at the end of 2007. And no wonder, the Fed has been purchasing fixed income securities at a record pace, doubling its holdings to more than $2 trillion in the last year according to the FT.
Where have all the traders gone?
Thursday, August 6th, 2009Apparently, no where. In looking at the latest financial data for futures commission merchants that must be filed on a monthly basis, it seemed the amount in overall customer seg funds had dropped about $5 billion from the previous month (June data filed by July 31). But an inside the numbers look shows some surprises: A year ago, the total customer seg funds was a whopping $169 billion for the same period verses $138 billion in 2009. That certainly shows erosion in customer funds, which can be a rough gauge of customers in the market. But to give more perspective, for the same period in 2007, total customer seg funds were $115 billion, while a year earlier they were $106 billion. The summer months typically show a dip, and this year was no exception. Where were FCMs last fall when markets and companies were going off the charts? November 2008 had total seg funds of $166 billion. Overall all, discounting a few billion here and and a few billion there, the industry still has grown dramatically over the past couple years, at least according to the financial data filed into the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
