HFT

Another Flash Crash Hits Wall Street

A Flash Crash hit all major US stock markets this afternoon when a hacked Associated Press alert appeared which stated that two major explosions occurred at the White House, injuring President Barack Obama. Within seconds all the major stock indexes - the Dow Jones Industrials, the S&P 500, and the NASDAQ, began plummeting.

Friday Movie Night - The Flash Crash

It's Friday Night! Party Time!  Time to relax, put your feet up on the couch, lay back, and watch some detailed videos on economic policy!  Tonight's documentary is Money & Speed: Inside the Black Box.   It is a nanosecond by nanosecond account of the May 6th, 2010 flash crash,  the most famous of sudden jolts to the markets due to automated computerized trading. 

The Slap on the Wrist Financial and Corporate Crime Fines

corporate alliance pledgeHave you ever noticed that large corporations can get away with pretty much anything? Over and over again a major scandal breaks and in the end the fines are pennies on the dollar for the profits gained by these nefarious financial activities.

Banks can launder money with impunity and the consequences are a small fine in comparison to the profits made. No matter how egregious there are no criminal chargers or revoking of the bank's charter.

The British bank Standard Chartered said on Thursday that it expected to pay $330 million to settle claims by United States government agencies that it had moved hundreds of billions of dollars on behalf of Iran.

At first glance the record $1.9 billion HSBC fine for laundering Mexican drug cartel money looks like a solid. Yet buried in the fine print, HSBC avoids charges via deferred prosecution.

Reads Around the Internets - Where Do Jobs Come From?

shocknews Welcome to the weekly roundup of great articles, facts and figures. These are the economic and financial finds that made our eyes pop.

 

Where Do Jobs Come From?

Economist Jared Bernstein has laid out in simple, easy to understand terms, the theory of stimulating the economy to indirectly create jobs. This article is in reference to Uncle Ben's latest quantitative easing.

Outsourcing Has Its Benefits - Money Landering, Stock Market Crashes and Failed Projects

bubble prickAh, we all know the claim offshore outsourcing is good for America. Seems offshore outsourcing is great for drug dealers and money launders too. Did you know offshore outsourcing enabled money laundering, flash crashes and failed projects?

The latest banking scandal of Standard Chartered laundering Iranian money is all over the news. But did you know Standard Chartered Bank offshore outsourced to India their entire compliance operations?

The DFS probe found that SCB had assured the New York state in May 2010 that it would take immediate steps to comply with the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctions. However, another regulatory examination in 2011 found continuing and significant Anti Money Laundering failures.

Among these, the bank was outsourcing its "entire OFAC compliance process for the New York branch to Chennai, India, with no evidence of any oversight or communication between the Chennai and the New York offices."