Flash Boys - my review

I finally got around to reading "Flash Boys" by Michael Lewis.   Bottom line, like a lot of non-fiction books, it is pretty good, but probably could be half as long.

The basic story, in case you haven't read it is as follows {SPOILER ALERT}

• RBC Equity trader suspects that his trades are being front run  - someone is anticipating his moves and then picking off his juicy trades by jacking the price very slightly.
• After much research (using LinkedIn and experts in fibre optic cables) he figures out the problem.
• The fragmented nature of equity markets - there are more than 30 equity trading venues - coupled with the speed at which information flows from one market to another - allows high frequency traders to lure trades to one market then pull back depth and pick off the trade at the next market.
• The solution is to slow down trades
• RBC Equity trader quits his day job and creates a new exchange which works on the idea that by slowing down trading, you remove the advantage to the HFT guys.
• After a slow start, the new exchange does really well, because people hate getting ripped off the by the HFT guys.   
• The exchange is still going:  http://www.iextrading.com/

There are a couple of side stories.  Apparently someone is laying fibre from New York to Chicago.   Also a coder goes to jail for apparently stealing open source code from Goldman.  But really he wasn't a bad guy.

Overall, worth a read if you are interested in HFT, but if you are not, then it's a pretty geeky book and probably not worth the effort.

The broader takeaway from the book is that a huge amount of money is being made from HFT.   Because HFT isn't a value creating enterprise, and the stock market is basically a zero-sum game, this means that this money is coming from investors.  Investors who have money in pension funds and mutual funds etc.  People like me.

Bottom line.  To quote Josh Brown: "The way to defeat high frequency traders is to be a low frequency trader"

Buffett's bet against a Hedge Fund manager

We're in year 6 of Warren Buffett's million dollar bet against Hedgie Ted Seides.   Buffett bet that the S&P 500 index would crush a portfolio of hedge funds hand picked by Seides.

So far, Buffett is correct.  The index is stomping on the hedge funds.

Of course, there's no surprise here.  If you are interested in long term capital appreciation a portfolio of indexed stocks will virtually always outperform a fund that is charging 2/20 and is run by people who think that they are smarter than the market.

What's amusing is that Seides is now coming up with excuses for why it's not a fair competition.  You can read them here. 

Thanks to my accounting colleague, Don for the link.

Apple's cash mountain

It just gets bigger...http://www.bbc.com/news/business-31016446

NC State Jenkins Online MBA is ranked #9 by US News.

Fantastic news today.  Our online MBA program is ranked #9 by US News.  From the beginning, we focussed on creating a very high quality experience for our students, and it's nice to see that this focus has paid off.

http://www.usnews.com/education/online-education/north-carolina-state-university-raleigh-OBUS0421/mba

For details about the Jenkins MBA - check out this link.

The efficient frontier works ... in the long run.

Wonderful post by Cliff Asness that shows in the short run the basic tenets of risk and return seem to get all jumbled up (bonds earning more than stocks, etc), but in the long run it all works out.

That's the point.   In the long run it all works out.   Trashing finance theories because they didn't work this week is stupid.  As is basing asset allocation decisions on short term performance and market conditions.  

Here's the conclusion it all of its finance theory supporting beauty.

ESOP at a grocery store

Apparently the employees of the Winco grocery chain are doing very well in the retirement department, thanks to an ESOP (employee share ownership plan).  

This Forbes article gushes about awesome this all is, but makes no mention of the elephant in the room.   I'll give you a hint:  Nobody at Enron ever thought that their retirement plans would become worthless overnight!!  

So while the ESOP makes a lot of sense in some ways, in other ways, the employees are horribly un-diversified.  They are one very bad salmonella outbreak away from loosing their jobs and their savings.

AQR puts data library online

AQR - the investment firm, has published the data sets used in its research papers.   A great resource for those interested in testing out momentum and other strategies!

https://www.aqr.com/cliffs-perspective/introducing-the-aqr-data-library