Slashdot Mirror
Computer Problem Caused Price Errors on NASDAQ
buckthorn writes "An article running on Yahoo News states: 'A computer problem at an unidentified stock trader caused erroneous, exaggerated prices -- some as high as $950 per share -- to be posted to the Nasdaq Stock Market Friday morning for 1,680 different stocks, a spokeswoman for the Nasdaq said.'"
Good afternoon gentlemen. As you are all no doubt aware, I have perfected a method of manipulating the various stock exchanges throughout the world. You received proof of this this morning, as relatively worthless Nasdaq stocks such as Maxco, Inc. and J.W. Mays Inc. traded briefly at hundreds of times their real value. I believe my latest caper, which I've puckishly dubbed 'Operation Stocking-Stuffer', is certainly worthy of your attention...
You see, gentleman, when 'Operation Stocking-Stuffer' is deployed in earnest, all stock exchanges will be laid waste...all trade will effectively cease, and global civilization itself will crumble...that is...unless you pay me...
Gentleman, you have my demands...peace out.
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
Sell! Sell!
A problem where technology caused wildly erroneous stock prices? I liked it the first time around when it was called the dot com bubble. The parties were better.
Was first post on a non-duped Slashdot story on part of the demands?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signature_bloc
Michael Bolton: I must have put a decimal point in the wrong place or something. Shit. I always do that. I always mess up some mundane detail.
Rule #1 -- Politics always trumps technology.
It was either a programming error (human) or an operator error (human) or some other cause. OK, clearly hardware faults can cause data corruption, but this is really pretty rare and it's hard to believe that a hardware fault could cause such a widespread fault.
Another good reason to eliminate The Human Factor. Let the Robot Age begin!
Just look at SCO's share prices.
Damnit, I could have made some money! Except that my funds are tied-up in a Nigerian opportunity at the moment. But boy-o-boy is that opportunity gonna make me rich! Rich! I say!
This issue was actually caused by trading software provider Trading Technologies (who are currently suing all of their clients due to supposed patent violations). It was caused by a bug in their automatic spread trading module, which caused it to run amok on one of their client's trading consoles.
No, but they did trade at 3.14159265
- Minutus cantorum, minutus balorum, minutus carborata descendum pantorum.
It's like that, but not as gay because there's no purple elves.