Courtesy of 12.26.13 CNBC interview with Andrew McOrmond, Managing Director/WallachBeth Capital
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6xlH1rTr30&w=420&h=315]
Archives: December , 2013
Bitcoin: Debunking the Myths
Courtesy of TABB Contributor Nicholas Colas, ConvergEx Group
In the rush to understand what bitcoin is – and isn’t – the public discussion on the topic has gotten a bit muddy. Here are 11 bitcoin myths and the reality under the hype and confusion.
MarketsMuse Editor Note: In deference to copyright and proprietary content protocols, below are 7 of the 11 myths characterized by Nick Colas.. Link below brings you to the full article at TABB Forum. If you are not a paying subscriber, no worries; unconfirmed rumors indicate that TABB is said to be pondering the acceptance of Bitcoins
Haters gonna hate, but the “Bitcoin bubble” meme has become the financial equivalent of a viral online cat video – wildly popular but pretty vacuous. Today we separate fact from fiction and review 11 bitcoin myths.
Myth #1: Bitcoin is huge
Myth #2: Bitcoin is a major problem in dealing with drugs and terrorism
Myth #3: Bitcoin is a currency. Reality: Bitcoin really is a cross between a mutually held company or large partnership and a money transfer business.
Myth #4: Bitcoin has never been more volatile than now, with all the attention it is getting.
Myth #6: Bitcoin is a store of value.
Myth #7: Bitcoin is untraceable.
Myth #8: Loss of anonymity will make bitcoin worthless.
$ROBO Adds New Dimension to ETF Universe; Robo-Stox Does What Man Can’t
Courtesy of Katie Spence
R
obots take over ETFs
Right now, Robo-Stox is the only ETF that’s focused solely on robotics and automation-related companies. And while you do have to pay a management fee, it’s currently priced at 0.95%, which basically means you’ll pay $9.50 a year for every $1,000 invested. Plus, while the fund has been around since only late October, Frank Tobe, co-founder of Robo-Stox recently told The Motley Fool that Robo-Stox currently has almost $28 million in assets invested in “77 companies in accordance with a weighting and set of selection criteria” — that’s pretty impressive given how long the fund has been in operation.
Perhaps the best part of this fund? As Blake Bos, the Fool’s industrials analyst, pointed out, Robo-Stox gives investors access to companies that are not on American exchanges, but are some of the biggest names in robotics. This includes, but is not limited to, Yaskawa Electric, Fanuc, and Kuka.
The robotics revolution
Robots aren’t going away. In fact, as technology progresses, they could become as commonplace as today’s cell phones. Indeed, Leila Takayama, a researcher at Willow Garage, a robotics company that builds hardware and open-source software, says that she hopes robots become “unremarkable” in society, and that “they’re just so useful, just so faded into the background that we don’t notice that they’re there all the time.”
That could either be great, or it could be disastrous. But one thing’s certain: If you invest in the right robotics company, you could make a significant return on your investment as robots become more popular. However, if you’d rather mitigate the risk of investing in a single company, an ETF like Robo-Stox could be a great way to spread your investment over a wide range of companies. That way, if robots steal your job, hopefully you’ll have a lucrative investment to fall back on.
Robot Rings the NASDAQ Bell
JPMorgan To Pay $2bil re Madoff Matter; Criminal Charges Loom Against Big Bank
JPMorgan Chase and federal authorities are nearing settlements over the bank’s ties to Bernard L. Madoff, striking tentative deals that would involve roughly $2 billion in penalties and a rare criminal action. The government will use a sizable portion of the money to compensate Mr. Madoff’s victims.
The settlements, which are coming together on the anniversary of Mr. Madoff’s arrest at his Manhattan penthouse five years ago on Wednesday, would fault the bank for turning a blind eye to his huge Ponzi scheme, according to people briefed on the case who were not authorized to speak publicly. Click here for link to the full story
Algorithms & Altruism 101: Big Buy-Side Player Want Better, Going Back Upstairs
Take-away from (2) news articles today profiling proliferation of algorithmic trading strategies: The buyside “gets it”, but they don’t want it..
Excerpt from WSJ’s Bradley Hope article “Buyside Traders Move Upstairs”: Some of the world’s biggest investors are changing the way they trade in U.S. markets in response to what they say are rising risks for institutions of their size.
The strategies include conducting more “upstairs trades,” in which deals are executed among big institutions, bypassing the broader market, as well as other sophisticated order-routing techniques designed to avoid pitfalls that have become increasingly apparent to investment managers.
Investors say such measures are increasingly necessary because the proliferation of algorithmic trading and other structural issues, including the fragmentation of the market, are hurting their ability to get the best prices and execute large trades quickly.
Excerpt from MarketsMedia “Buyside Traders Seek More..”
With algorithmic trading firmly entrenched in the electronic equity landscape, buy-side traders on an eternal quest for alpha preservation are moving beyond algo selection to algo optimization, which entails monitoring and calibrating as the trade is going down.
“The real objective is to get best execution, which often requires not only picking an algorithm but managing the parameters of that algorithm subject to market conditions,” said Michael Earlywine, head trader, North America at $1.2 billion asset manager Ecofin.
One of the more compelling critiques re: above noted topic is courtesy of industry veteran and electronic trading guru Thomas Quigley, Managing Director/Electronic Trading Group for agency boutique WallachBeth Capital, “The take-away from both articles is a message that we caveat whenever institutional firms reach out to us for guidance; however commoditized electronic trading approaches have become, and however easy it may seem to choose and implement algo-based strategies, the need for consultative and agnostic guidance has never been more relevant.”
Both above-noted news articles can be accessed by clicking on the logo links adjacent to the excerpt.
Euro-based Bond Platform Offers RFQ Trading for ETFs; US-based OMEX Trades Ahead
Courtesy of ETF Strategy
“..MTS, one of Europe’s largest electronic fixed income trading venues, is to launch request-for-quote (RFQ) trading for exchange-traded funds (ETFs) via its multi-dealer-to-client MTS BondVision platform.
The new service will offer liquidity providers access to a diverse community of global institutional investors.
The platform will support ETF products listed on the Borsa Italiana and London Stock Exchange, both of which are owned by the London Stock Exchange Group PLC.
By offering RFQ as a new execution method in addition to the order book trading functionality currently offered by the two exchanges, MTS is seeking to improve the efficiency of executing these products and increase trading opportunities for all market participants..”
Observed John Houlahan, COO of US-based OMEX Systems, the broker-neutral OEMS platform used by leading ETF, option and futures market participants, and provides direct market access to multiple exchanges and liquidity centers, “Hats off to MTS. Even if RFQ is a functionality that fixed-income players as well as institutional equity trading desks are long-accustomed to, and that some of us are already well into next-generation request functionality, from a trading technology industry “business model” angle, the underlying story is clear: niche players offering single-asset class products are kidding themselves if they think that is a sustainable model.”
Added Houlahan, a 20-year veteran of the trading technology space, “MTS certainly seems to recognize that electronic trading for all but the most liquid fixed income products is still at the early stages of evolution and large-scale user adoption. It makes sense to leverage their technology, just as equities systems vendors are now attempting to step into the bond and futures arenas. Those who can overcome not just the technological and regulatory issues, but the political and cultural nuances that distinguish the ways various assets actually trade in secondary markets will be remembered as real pioneers.”