Market Structure Insights

October 16, 2019

I’ve never bet on sports, but the bulk of wagers is on the spread – whether the outcome will be above or below a range. In the stock market spreads rule too, and data suggest market-makers are gambling on which things will move. The most...

October 9, 2019

What do you do in Steamboat Springs when autumn arrives at the Botanic Park? Why, have a Food & Wine Festival of course! Meanwhile the derivatives festival in equities continues, thanks to the SEC, which through Rule 6c-11 is now blanket-exempting the greatest financial mania...

October 2, 2019

Markets swoon and again comes a hunt for why, because news offered no warning. The news has bad data, which makes for bad news. ModernIR warned. More shortly. Meanwhile in Steamboat Springs the slopes are painted the palette of Thanksgiving, and a road leads to...

September 25, 2019

Curtains are window-dressing. Curtains loom. But not the way you think. I’ll explain. Before that, here in New York it’s Indian Summer, and Karen snapped this midtown shot after we stopped in at The Smith before two busy days of client visits. Next up, Washington...

September 18, 2019

In 1975, there were no electronic exchanges in the United States.  Now the average S&P 500 component trades electronically 17,000 times daily in 134-share increments totaling a mean of $500 million of stock. Yet public companies still have a 1975 standard of shareholder disclosure from...

September 11, 2019

There’s a story going around about an epochal rotation from momentum (growth) to value in stocks. It may be a hoax. I’ll explain in a bit. First the facts. It began Monday when without warning the iShares Edge MSCI USA Value Factor ETF (VLUE) veered...

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