Watchdog advises ending early look at jobs data

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP-Excite

By JOSH BOAK and CHRISTOPHER S. RUGABER

WASHINGTON (AP) - A Labor Department watchdog has recommended ending a practice that allows reporters to review a key unemployment report before it is made public.

Media "lockups" for weekly unemployment benefits are a problem because news outlets can feed the data to investment firms and financial exchanges immediately after the lockup ends, the Labor Department's Office of the Inspector General said in a report released Thursday.

Several news services use software to transmit the economic data to traders, who then profit because they have the data fractions of a second before other investors. The AP provides such data to the Nasdaq exchange, which then sells the data to its customers.

In its report, the Inspector General recommended adopting procedures that eliminate such competitive advantages or discontinuing the lockups entirely.

FULL story at link.


Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20140102/DAB2UR7G0.html

[1StrongBlackMan]

1. There is something really wrong with the current model ...

when profits depend on, not being smarter, or producing a better core product; but on technology's speed.

[okaawhatever]

2. So the AP makes money by getting the info for free and then selling it, Nasdaq makes money

by selling the info to it's clients and the taxpayers foot the bill for collecting the info. Any question why we have a huge national debt and rich bankers? Not to mention a media that has sided with big business for years now.