skip to main |
skip to sidebar
As I am sure you have heard NASDAQ trading for stocks and options was halted earlier today around 12:23 PM because of a computer trading glitch. It is now scheduled to reopen for trading at 3:25 PM although quite a few stocks are now showing quotes.
The NDX (Nasdaq 100) futures never stopped trading.
Two NASDAQ listed stocks, Autodesk and Scansource, will report their financial results after the bell as scheduled.
NEW YORK (AP) — Another computer glitch is sowing confusion on Wall Street.
Trading in the Nasdaq, a major stock exchange dominated by the biggest names in technology, was halted shortly after midday Thursday due to an unknown technical glitch. Nearly two hours later, trading was still frozen. Other exchanges were trading normally.
The disruption sent brokers scurrying to figure out what went wrong and raised new questions about the pitfalls of computer-driven stock trading.
Thursday's Nasdaq freeze echoed earlier stock market snafus, such the sudden plunge in stocks in May 2010 that came to be known as the "flash crash" and the glitch-plagued initial public offering of Facebook last year.
The exchange sent out an alert to traders saying that trading was being halted until further notice because of problems with a quote dissemination system. Nasdaq said it wouldn't be canceling any open orders, but that customers could cancel orders if they wanted to...
I remember this particular gentleman very well, and when he was fired for daring to attempt to investigate a powerful Wall Street figure for insider trading.
Here is some background on his case, and his reflections on the current state of the SEC.
Some of his comments strongly echo the thoughts presented in Bill Moyer's new interview with Mark Leibovich, author of This Town.
I found this to be very interesting detail on the operation of the Shanghai Gold Exchange. It was provided by comment at Dave's GoldenTruth site here.
The market is a hybrid of a physical and futures market.
I don't know if you are familiar with the operation of Shanghai Gold Exchange. The most frequently traded gold products are Au9999, Au9995 and Au(T+D). The most frequently traded silver product is Ag(T+D).
Au9999 and Au9995 are cash products. Au9999 is 1 kg of gold 99.99% pure and Au9995 is 1 kg of gold 99.95% pure. You just trade them like trading stocks.
Au (T+D) (the contract size is 1kg of gold no less than 99.95% pure) is similar to futures contracts but it does NOT have a specific delivery month. Delivery can take place every trading day. Between 15:00-15:30 (Beijing time, GMT+8) of every trading day, all the longs/shorts can submit their intentions to take/make delivery.
If there are more intentions to take delivery than those to make delivery, all the shorts of Au (T+D) must pay the longs Deferred Compensation Fee: short to long. If there are more intentions to make delivery than those to take delivery, all the longs of Au (T+D) must pay all the shorts Deferred Compensation Fee: long to short.
For example: http://www.sge.sh/publish/sgeen/sge_price/sge_price_daily/10378.htm
On Aug 21, 2013, 6,848 kg of gold was delivered for Au(T+D). There were more intentions to take delivery than make delivery. All the shorts of Au(T+D) had pay longs deferred compensation fee, short to long.
The Paying Direction of Deferred Compensation Fee is, IMO, more important than the amount of delivery.
The delivery of Au(T+D) is actually to change the names of the owner of the gold. The gold is still in the vault (usually a bank vault). The 6,848 kg of gold just changed owners. It is still in the vault(s).
The Shanghai Gold Exchange also publishes weekly and monthly reports. But in those reports, the definition of delivery is DIFFERENT. There, the SGE defines delivery as the amount of gold moved out of the vault(s).
For example, in the monthly report of July, the SGE reports that 235417.4 kg of gold was delivered. That means 235417.4kg of gold was moved out of the vault(s).
http://www.sge.sh/publish/sge/docs/20130812162935744053.pdf
(I can't find an English version for you)
As for silver, Ag(T+D) is the equivalent of Au(T+D). The contract size is 1kg of silver 99.99% pure. But since silver is not VAT free in China. Silver market participants usually choose not to make/take delivery of silver at the Shanghai Gold Exchange because making/taking delivery of silver at the Shanghai Gold Exchange is difficult to evade the VAT.
The futures made an intraday low of 1631.50 which is a tag on the 50% retracement and the bottom of the uptrending channel.
And they bounced hard off this.
Now we see if there is a follow through, with perhaps a retest, or a failed support and breakdown.
