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The Week-end Stock Pot Watch, Thursday, November 28th-December 1st. Holiday Edition!
Last edited Thu Nov 28, 2013, 09:12 AM - Edit history (1)
Since the markets are closed, and Tansy is probably drinking (I am), and making goodies for dinner, just post whatever you want here, concerning the economy, recipe tips, jokes, golf tips or drink recipes.
Everyone have a Merry Thanksgiving.
We're thankful for all of our contributor friends.
99 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
http://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/How-Much-Money-Could-a-Well-Insulated-House-Save-You.html
Heating a home is one of the largest household costs these days, and the best way of reducing this cost is with a more efficient, better insulated home.
Shrinkthatfootprint.com claims that it is even possible for a home to be so well insulated against heat loss or gains that only the sun, our bodies, a few simple appliances, and a basic heat recovery system would be enough to provide all the necessary heat for a comfortable existence. Basically, if the insulation is good enough then you need never worry about heating bills.
In the diagram below Shrinkthatfootprint.com provides a visual comparison of the heat gains and losses for three different types of insulated homes.
A Leaky House – is the most poorly insulated example. It consists of solid walls, an uninsulated floor, single glazed windows, and lots of draughts. In order to combat the high level of heat loss the leaky house requires 300 kilowatt hours of heat energy per square metre per year to remain at a comfortable temperature.
A Modern House – is the typical new build house that many people own. It has insulation between the walls, in the loft and the floor, double glazing windows, and far fewer draughts. This all helps to drastically reduce the energy needed to heat the property to 150 kilowatt hours per square metre per year.
A Passive House – is the most perfectly insulated property imaginable. All materials used to build it offer good insulation. It has triple glazed windows, and is so air tight that a ventilation system is needed to keep the air fresh. It estimated to need just 15 kilowatt hours per square metre per year, most of which can actually be generated through a heat recovery system in the ventilation system.
The difference in heating bills for an average sized home in each class has been estimated to be $1,500 a year for the leaky home, $750 a year for the modern home, and just $100 a year for the passive home.
Unfortunately for those living in poorly insulated houses, cost effective retrofits are difficult to achieve and it is far easier to create a well-insulated house during the construction phase of a new build.
Heating a home is one of the largest household costs these days, and the best way of reducing this cost is with a more efficient, better insulated home.
Shrinkthatfootprint.com claims that it is even possible for a home to be so well insulated against heat loss or gains that only the sun, our bodies, a few simple appliances, and a basic heat recovery system would be enough to provide all the necessary heat for a comfortable existence. Basically, if the insulation is good enough then you need never worry about heating bills.
In the diagram below Shrinkthatfootprint.com provides a visual comparison of the heat gains and losses for three different types of insulated homes.
A Leaky House – is the most poorly insulated example. It consists of solid walls, an uninsulated floor, single glazed windows, and lots of draughts. In order to combat the high level of heat loss the leaky house requires 300 kilowatt hours of heat energy per square metre per year to remain at a comfortable temperature.
A Modern House – is the typical new build house that many people own. It has insulation between the walls, in the loft and the floor, double glazing windows, and far fewer draughts. This all helps to drastically reduce the energy needed to heat the property to 150 kilowatt hours per square metre per year.
A Passive House – is the most perfectly insulated property imaginable. All materials used to build it offer good insulation. It has triple glazed windows, and is so air tight that a ventilation system is needed to keep the air fresh. It estimated to need just 15 kilowatt hours per square metre per year, most of which can actually be generated through a heat recovery system in the ventilation system.
The difference in heating bills for an average sized home in each class has been estimated to be $1,500 a year for the leaky home, $750 a year for the modern home, and just $100 a year for the passive home.
Unfortunately for those living in poorly insulated houses, cost effective retrofits are difficult to achieve and it is far easier to create a well-insulated house during the construction phase of a new build.
http://www.businessinsider.com/youth-unemployment-in-europe-2013-11
New European unemployment data is out today.
The headline unemployment rate came in at 12.1% vs 21.2% expected.
As usual, the numbers on youth unemployment are totally staggering.
Total Eurozone youth unemployment is 24.4%.
In Italy it's 41.2%.
In Spain it's 57.4%.
In Portugal it's 36.5%. And so on and so on.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/youth-unemployment-in-europe-2013-11#ixzz2m2r3l7yf
New European unemployment data is out today.
The headline unemployment rate came in at 12.1% vs 21.2% expected.
As usual, the numbers on youth unemployment are totally staggering.
Total Eurozone youth unemployment is 24.4%.
In Italy it's 41.2%.
In Spain it's 57.4%.
In Portugal it's 36.5%. And so on and so on.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/youth-unemployment-in-europe-2013-11#ixzz2m2r3l7yf
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-11-27/bitcoin-tops-1000
Well that escalated quickly. Having broken above $900 yesterday to new record highs (and a 100% gain in a week), the crypto currency is not looking back now. On what is higher than average volume this morning, Bitcoin just broke above the magic $1000 level for the first time (at $1025). Meanwhile, the BTC China "arb'd" rate is around $950 for those playing at home; and Litecoin has just topped $26 (from $4 a week ago!).
Well that escalated quickly. Having broken above $900 yesterday to new record highs (and a 100% gain in a week), the crypto currency is not looking back now. On what is higher than average volume this morning, Bitcoin just broke above the magic $1000 level for the first time (at $1025). Meanwhile, the BTC China "arb'd" rate is around $950 for those playing at home; and Litecoin has just topped $26 (from $4 a week ago!).
http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21590901-it-looks-overvalued-even-if-digital-currency-crashes-others-will-follow-bitcoin
It looks overvalued. But even if this digital currency crashes, others will follow...BITCOIN is booming. Investors are piling into the digital currency, which is not issued by a central bank but is conjured into being by cryptographic software running on a network of volunteers’ computers. This week the price of a Bitcoin soared to above $1,000, from less than $15 in January.
Having long been favoured by libertarians, gold bugs and drug dealers, Bitcoin is attracting some surprising new fans. Germany has recognised it as a “unit of account”. Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve, told a Senate committee on virtual currencies that the idea “may hold long-term promise”. A small but growing band of shops and firms accept payments in Bitcoin. Some like the way it allows funds to be transferred directly between users, without middlemen. Others are attracted by the potential for anonymous transfers, or by the fact that the number of Bitcoins in circulation has a fixed upper limit—so there is no way a central bank can inflate their value away by issuing more.
But the recent price surge, driven by Chinese investors stashing money offshore, looks like a classic bubble. Hoarding means that Bitcoin is currently more of a speculative asset than a currency. And a crash is not the only risk Bitcoin users face. As the price rises, Bitcoin theft is increasing, both from individuals and from online exchanges that store the coins and convert them into other currencies. Around $1m in Bitcoins was recently stolen from BIPS, a European exchange. GBL, a Chinese Bitcoin exchange, abruptly vanished in October, taking $4.1m-worth of deposits with it.
The system itself is straining at the seams (see Technology Quarterly). The amount of computing power consumed by its transaction-verification system, which has the side-effect of “mining” new Bitcoins, is mushrooming: it now far exceeds that of the world’s 500 fastest supercomputers combined. At the same time Bitcoin’s method of recording and processing transactions, and compensating those who verify them, is becoming unwieldy. Adjusting Bitcoin’s protocols, however, requires getting the volunteers who maintain its software to agree on the necessary changes, and the Bitcoin community to adopt them, before anything goes wrong...
MORE
It looks overvalued. But even if this digital currency crashes, others will follow...BITCOIN is booming. Investors are piling into the digital currency, which is not issued by a central bank but is conjured into being by cryptographic software running on a network of volunteers’ computers. This week the price of a Bitcoin soared to above $1,000, from less than $15 in January.
Having long been favoured by libertarians, gold bugs and drug dealers, Bitcoin is attracting some surprising new fans. Germany has recognised it as a “unit of account”. Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve, told a Senate committee on virtual currencies that the idea “may hold long-term promise”. A small but growing band of shops and firms accept payments in Bitcoin. Some like the way it allows funds to be transferred directly between users, without middlemen. Others are attracted by the potential for anonymous transfers, or by the fact that the number of Bitcoins in circulation has a fixed upper limit—so there is no way a central bank can inflate their value away by issuing more.
But the recent price surge, driven by Chinese investors stashing money offshore, looks like a classic bubble. Hoarding means that Bitcoin is currently more of a speculative asset than a currency. And a crash is not the only risk Bitcoin users face. As the price rises, Bitcoin theft is increasing, both from individuals and from online exchanges that store the coins and convert them into other currencies. Around $1m in Bitcoins was recently stolen from BIPS, a European exchange. GBL, a Chinese Bitcoin exchange, abruptly vanished in October, taking $4.1m-worth of deposits with it.
The system itself is straining at the seams (see Technology Quarterly). The amount of computing power consumed by its transaction-verification system, which has the side-effect of “mining” new Bitcoins, is mushrooming: it now far exceeds that of the world’s 500 fastest supercomputers combined. At the same time Bitcoin’s method of recording and processing transactions, and compensating those who verify them, is becoming unwieldy. Adjusting Bitcoin’s protocols, however, requires getting the volunteers who maintain its software to agree on the necessary changes, and the Bitcoin community to adopt them, before anything goes wrong...
MORE
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-11-26/chart-day-how-five-short-years-breakneck-liquification-china-humiliated-worlds-centr
The concept of the "liquidity trap" is well-known to most: it is that freak outlier in an otherwise spotless Keynesian plane, when due to the need for negative interest rates to boost the economy (usually resulting from that other inevitable Keynesian state: the bursting of an asset bubble) - a structural impossibility according to most economists although an increasingly more probable in Europe - central banks have no choice but to offset a deleveraging private banking sector and directly inject liquidity into the banking sector, with the outcome being soaring asset prices and even more bubbles, which will eventually burst only to be replaced with even more failed attempts at reflation. Sadly, very little of this liquidity makes its way to the broad economy as the ongoing recession in the developed world has shown for the 5th year in a row, which in turn makes the liqudity trap even worse, and so on in a closed loop.
Since there is little else in the central bankers' arsenal that is as effective in boosting the "wealth effect" - which is how they validate their actions to themselves and other economists and politicians - they continue to do ever more QE. And since banks are assured at generating far greater returns on allocated capital in the markets, where they can use the excess deposits they obtain courtesy of the Fed's generous reserve-a-palooza as initial margin for risk-on trades, the liquidity pipelines remain stuck throughout the world, and loan creation - that traditional money creation pathway - is permanently blocked (as is the case empirically in both the US and Europe, where private-sector loan creation is declining at a record pace).
Everywhere except the one place that has yet to actually engage in conventional quantitative easing: China. At least explicitly, because loan creation by China's state-controlled entities and otherwise government backstopped banks, is anything but conventional money creation. One can, therefore, claim that China's loan creation is a form of Quasi-QE whereby banks, constrained from investing in a relatively shallow stock market, and unable to freely transfer the CNY-denominated liquidity abroad, are forced to lend it out knowing that if things turn sour at the end of the day, the PBOC will bail them out. Paradoxically, this "non-QE" is exactly how QE should work in the US and other developed markets...In order to offset the lack of loan creation by commercial banks, the "Big 4" central banks - Fed, ECB, BOJ and BOE - have had no choice but the open the liquidity spigots to the max. This has resulted in a total developed world "Big 4" central bank balance of just under $10 trillion, of which the bulk of asset additions has taken place since the Lehman collapse.
How does this compare to what China has done? As can be seen on the chart below, in just the past 5 years alone, Chinese bank assets (and by implication liabilities) have grown by an astounding $15 trillion, bringing the total to over $24 trillion, as we showed yesterday. In other words, China has expanded its financial balance sheet by 50% more than the assets of all global central banks combined! And that is how - in a global centrally-planned regime which is where everyone now is, DM or EM - your flood your economy with liquidity. Perhaps the Fed, ECB or BOJ should hire some PBOC consultants to show them how it's really done.
The concept of the "liquidity trap" is well-known to most: it is that freak outlier in an otherwise spotless Keynesian plane, when due to the need for negative interest rates to boost the economy (usually resulting from that other inevitable Keynesian state: the bursting of an asset bubble) - a structural impossibility according to most economists although an increasingly more probable in Europe - central banks have no choice but to offset a deleveraging private banking sector and directly inject liquidity into the banking sector, with the outcome being soaring asset prices and even more bubbles, which will eventually burst only to be replaced with even more failed attempts at reflation. Sadly, very little of this liquidity makes its way to the broad economy as the ongoing recession in the developed world has shown for the 5th year in a row, which in turn makes the liqudity trap even worse, and so on in a closed loop.
Since there is little else in the central bankers' arsenal that is as effective in boosting the "wealth effect" - which is how they validate their actions to themselves and other economists and politicians - they continue to do ever more QE. And since banks are assured at generating far greater returns on allocated capital in the markets, where they can use the excess deposits they obtain courtesy of the Fed's generous reserve-a-palooza as initial margin for risk-on trades, the liquidity pipelines remain stuck throughout the world, and loan creation - that traditional money creation pathway - is permanently blocked (as is the case empirically in both the US and Europe, where private-sector loan creation is declining at a record pace).
Everywhere except the one place that has yet to actually engage in conventional quantitative easing: China. At least explicitly, because loan creation by China's state-controlled entities and otherwise government backstopped banks, is anything but conventional money creation. One can, therefore, claim that China's loan creation is a form of Quasi-QE whereby banks, constrained from investing in a relatively shallow stock market, and unable to freely transfer the CNY-denominated liquidity abroad, are forced to lend it out knowing that if things turn sour at the end of the day, the PBOC will bail them out. Paradoxically, this "non-QE" is exactly how QE should work in the US and other developed markets...In order to offset the lack of loan creation by commercial banks, the "Big 4" central banks - Fed, ECB, BOJ and BOE - have had no choice but the open the liquidity spigots to the max. This has resulted in a total developed world "Big 4" central bank balance of just under $10 trillion, of which the bulk of asset additions has taken place since the Lehman collapse.
How does this compare to what China has done? As can be seen on the chart below, in just the past 5 years alone, Chinese bank assets (and by implication liabilities) have grown by an astounding $15 trillion, bringing the total to over $24 trillion, as we showed yesterday. In other words, China has expanded its financial balance sheet by 50% more than the assets of all global central banks combined! And that is how - in a global centrally-planned regime which is where everyone now is, DM or EM - your flood your economy with liquidity. Perhaps the Fed, ECB or BOJ should hire some PBOC consultants to show them how it's really done.
http://economicsone.com/2013/11/23/two-amazing-charts/
by John Taylor
Research by Christopher Erceg and Andrew Levin is providing solid evidence that the decline in the labor force participation rate since 2007 has been due to cyclical factors–the recession and slow recovery–rather than to demographic factors. In other words, the fact that such a large number of people have dropped out of the labor force is associated with the weak economy rather than to their reaching their retirement years–or some other typical demographic trend. Because the unemployment rate does not count the people who dropped out of the labor force it no longer gives a good reading of the state of the labor market. The unemployment rate would be much higher without this large decline in labor force participation.
In the latest version of their paper Chris and Andy estimate how large the US unemployment rate would be without this abnormal decline in the labor force, and they produced this amazing chart which summarizes their findings (I tweeted about this yesterday).
?w=640
ErcegLevin_26aug2013 Fig 6 right
That the actual unemployment rate has become such a poor indicator of labor market trends is one reason why many economists have focused on the employment to population ratio. Here is an update of a chart I have been using for several years to illustrate the lack of progress in employing the working age population compared to recoveries from previous deep recessions, such as the recovery from the recessions in the early 1980s. It too is an amazing chart.
?w=640
by John Taylor
Research by Christopher Erceg and Andrew Levin is providing solid evidence that the decline in the labor force participation rate since 2007 has been due to cyclical factors–the recession and slow recovery–rather than to demographic factors. In other words, the fact that such a large number of people have dropped out of the labor force is associated with the weak economy rather than to their reaching their retirement years–or some other typical demographic trend. Because the unemployment rate does not count the people who dropped out of the labor force it no longer gives a good reading of the state of the labor market. The unemployment rate would be much higher without this large decline in labor force participation.
In the latest version of their paper Chris and Andy estimate how large the US unemployment rate would be without this abnormal decline in the labor force, and they produced this amazing chart which summarizes their findings (I tweeted about this yesterday).
?w=640
ErcegLevin_26aug2013 Fig 6 right
That the actual unemployment rate has become such a poor indicator of labor market trends is one reason why many economists have focused on the employment to population ratio. Here is an update of a chart I have been using for several years to illustrate the lack of progress in employing the working age population compared to recoveries from previous deep recessions, such as the recovery from the recessions in the early 1980s. It too is an amazing chart.
?w=640
She stopped eating the dry cat food. Last winter when she stopped eating, I took her to vet and she had a bad tooth that had to be pulled. Poor kitty 
But she recovered fine.
Thinking the cat may have another bad tooth, I took her to vet again, but teeth are ok. Oh, she is drinking a LOT of water. She is old, 16-17 years, and so a complete blood test was done. Some things were high, some were low, some indication that she has beginnings of kidney failure, but the vet was most interested in the low potassium. So the cat is getting potassium supplement gel that I mix with some baby food chicken. And she will eat that mixture. And she will eat some shredded cheese too.
But the really odd thing she does, is that she bites out her fur, in chunks. Very weird.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/APFN_US_ODD_BLACK_FRIDAY_RIPLEYS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-11-29-14-54-02
This undated image released by Ripley's Times Square Odditorium shows a vampire killing kit from India at Ripley's Times Square Odditorium in New York. The item is one of many from a featured collection up for sale until Dec. 24. (AP Photo/Ripley's Times Square Odditorium)
NEW YORK (AP) -- Where's a Black Friday shopper to turn for a 19th century vampire-killing kit?
Believe it or not, the item is part of the Black Friday madness at the Ripley's Times Square Odditorium. It will set you back about $25,000.
At a little more than $19,000 a shrunken head is a comparative bargain.
Or the thoughtful gift-giver might prefer a taxidermy Albino giraffe. The price tag is about $1.7 million. Gift-wrapping is not included.
Still got tons of room under the Christmas tree - and about $2.5 million to spare? Your loved one might be clamoring for 18th century, iron-clad elephant armor from India.
This undated image released by Ripley's Times Square Odditorium shows a vampire killing kit from India at Ripley's Times Square Odditorium in New York. The item is one of many from a featured collection up for sale until Dec. 24. (AP Photo/Ripley's Times Square Odditorium)
NEW YORK (AP) -- Where's a Black Friday shopper to turn for a 19th century vampire-killing kit?
Believe it or not, the item is part of the Black Friday madness at the Ripley's Times Square Odditorium. It will set you back about $25,000.
At a little more than $19,000 a shrunken head is a comparative bargain.
Or the thoughtful gift-giver might prefer a taxidermy Albino giraffe. The price tag is about $1.7 million. Gift-wrapping is not included.
Still got tons of room under the Christmas tree - and about $2.5 million to spare? Your loved one might be clamoring for 18th century, iron-clad elephant armor from India.
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/11/when-youve-lost-europeans-youve-lost-europe/281928/
A protester participates in a demonstration against government austerity measures in Oviedo, Spain on November 29. (Reuters)
The collective mood of a nation mired in a prolonged economic recession shows many of the symptoms of clinical depression: despair, fatalism, an inability to make decisions, lack of motivation, and irritability. This is one of the impressions I got from a recent trip to Spain and Italy, two nations I know well and visit often. While both countries have recently made small strides on the path to recovery, I nevertheless came away with the strong sense that their economies are in recession and their societies are in depression. In the course of my travels, I also felt more than ever before that Europeans have fallen out of love with Europe—or, more precisely, with the idea of building a Europe-wide union.
Hopelessness and irascibility are present in spades in statements by politicians, activists, and opinion leaders, and in media reports on the mood of the “people in the street.” Pessimism is the default attitude, and there is a notable paucity of the kinds of exciting ideas and proposals that energize society. All of this is understandable. When a family suffers a major trauma, it is natural for its members to react by becoming more self-absorbed and withdrawing from the world. The same is true for countries.
In both Italy and Spain—two of the hardest-hit economies in Europe—I found a tendency to turn inward and focus on events at home rather than developments abroad. My visit to Spain, for example, coincided with an incident in the Catalan Parliament in which a lawmaker took off his sandal and threatened Rodrigo Rato, the former head of the International Monetary Fund, who was testifying at a hearing about the large, bailed-out Spanish bank he had led, Bankia.
Naturally, the incident attracted a lot of media attention; almost everyone with whom I spoke in Spain mentioned it. What received significantly less press was the news that on that same day, in Beijing, Chinese officials had unveiled major economic reforms at the Communist Party’s Third Plenum. I noticed the same inward-looking attitude in Italy. For the past two decades, any visit to the country has been bound to coincide with some attention-grabbing news about Silvio Berlusconi and his relationship with power and, inevitably, women. This time was no different, with the buzz centering on the lead-up to the Italian Senate’s expulsion of the former Italian prime minister. And yet, if the decisions made at the Third Plenum help China avoid an abrupt economic slowdown that would harm the global economy—and prolong Italy and Spain's economic troubles—then what happened in Beijing will have a far greater impact on the lives of Italians and Spaniards than the theatrics of Catalonia’s sandal-toting legislator or the travails of Italy’s former prime minister. Despite these realities, I found that even well-informed elites in these countries are paying little attention to what is going on in China—or in the rest of the world, for that matter.
A protester participates in a demonstration against government austerity measures in Oviedo, Spain on November 29. (Reuters)
The collective mood of a nation mired in a prolonged economic recession shows many of the symptoms of clinical depression: despair, fatalism, an inability to make decisions, lack of motivation, and irritability. This is one of the impressions I got from a recent trip to Spain and Italy, two nations I know well and visit often. While both countries have recently made small strides on the path to recovery, I nevertheless came away with the strong sense that their economies are in recession and their societies are in depression. In the course of my travels, I also felt more than ever before that Europeans have fallen out of love with Europe—or, more precisely, with the idea of building a Europe-wide union.
Hopelessness and irascibility are present in spades in statements by politicians, activists, and opinion leaders, and in media reports on the mood of the “people in the street.” Pessimism is the default attitude, and there is a notable paucity of the kinds of exciting ideas and proposals that energize society. All of this is understandable. When a family suffers a major trauma, it is natural for its members to react by becoming more self-absorbed and withdrawing from the world. The same is true for countries.
In both Italy and Spain—two of the hardest-hit economies in Europe—I found a tendency to turn inward and focus on events at home rather than developments abroad. My visit to Spain, for example, coincided with an incident in the Catalan Parliament in which a lawmaker took off his sandal and threatened Rodrigo Rato, the former head of the International Monetary Fund, who was testifying at a hearing about the large, bailed-out Spanish bank he had led, Bankia.
Naturally, the incident attracted a lot of media attention; almost everyone with whom I spoke in Spain mentioned it. What received significantly less press was the news that on that same day, in Beijing, Chinese officials had unveiled major economic reforms at the Communist Party’s Third Plenum. I noticed the same inward-looking attitude in Italy. For the past two decades, any visit to the country has been bound to coincide with some attention-grabbing news about Silvio Berlusconi and his relationship with power and, inevitably, women. This time was no different, with the buzz centering on the lead-up to the Italian Senate’s expulsion of the former Italian prime minister. And yet, if the decisions made at the Third Plenum help China avoid an abrupt economic slowdown that would harm the global economy—and prolong Italy and Spain's economic troubles—then what happened in Beijing will have a far greater impact on the lives of Italians and Spaniards than the theatrics of Catalonia’s sandal-toting legislator or the travails of Italy’s former prime minister. Despite these realities, I found that even well-informed elites in these countries are paying little attention to what is going on in China—or in the rest of the world, for that matter.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-26/speed-traders-meet-nightmare-on-elm-street-with-nanex.html
Nanex Chart of Equity Trading after Chicago PMI Data on Feb. 28, 2013.
The nemesis of Wall Street’s high-frequency traders operates out of an apartment-sized office above the Bliss Salon -- manicure/pedicure $45 -- on Elm Street in the Chicago suburb of Winnetka.
Staring at four computer monitors,Eric Scott Hunsader, the founder of market-data provider Nanex LLC, looks for hints of illicit trading hidden in psychedelic images of triangles dancing with dots that represent quotes to buy and sell U.S. stocks broken down by the millisecond.
Charts of trading produced by Hunsader’s eight-person firm have captivated everyone from regulators to art gallery owners. One stunt involved a computerized piano piece mimicking quotes for an exchange-traded fund. He infuriates some traders, who say Nanex draws unwarranted conclusions and spreads conspiracy theories.
To Hunsader, the images created from market feeds are evidence of high-frequency trading firms exploiting market rules to turn a profit in a lawless environment. Though others in the industry see his reports and charts as propaganda, Nanex’s interpretations are helping to drive the public debate about the fundamental fairness of the modern stock market.
Nanex Chart of Equity Trading after Chicago PMI Data on Feb. 28, 2013.
The nemesis of Wall Street’s high-frequency traders operates out of an apartment-sized office above the Bliss Salon -- manicure/pedicure $45 -- on Elm Street in the Chicago suburb of Winnetka.
Staring at four computer monitors,Eric Scott Hunsader, the founder of market-data provider Nanex LLC, looks for hints of illicit trading hidden in psychedelic images of triangles dancing with dots that represent quotes to buy and sell U.S. stocks broken down by the millisecond.
Charts of trading produced by Hunsader’s eight-person firm have captivated everyone from regulators to art gallery owners. One stunt involved a computerized piano piece mimicking quotes for an exchange-traded fund. He infuriates some traders, who say Nanex draws unwarranted conclusions and spreads conspiracy theories.
To Hunsader, the images created from market feeds are evidence of high-frequency trading firms exploiting market rules to turn a profit in a lawless environment. Though others in the industry see his reports and charts as propaganda, Nanex’s interpretations are helping to drive the public debate about the fundamental fairness of the modern stock market.
