Oh Dear - When Algorithmic Trading Goes Wrong

It's fine that computer-generated trading programmes are increasingly taking over from old-fashioned flesh-and-blood traders, but algorithmics don't always get it right either. And an example of this was what happened last week with United Airlines stock.

Someone at Income Securities Advisors (ISA) was apparently Googling for routine bankruptcy information, and came across a 6-year-old Chicago Tribune article on the subject of United's 2002 bankruptcy, which had been posted on the South Florida Sun-Sentinel website with a current date. It wasn't long before Bloomberg, which uses ISA services, was incorrectly headlining on the subject of another 'bankruptcy' of the airline. Within a 12 minute period, some $1bn was wiped off the airline's market value, as shares dropped from $12 to $3. According to The International Herald Tribune, the damage done to United's stock price was mainly down to the 'interplay between the algorithms that search and compile information from the Web and the ones that Wall Street firms and hedge funds use to make trades automatically'.

Tribune Co, which owns the Sun-Sentinel, said that the article in question 'contains information that would clearly lead a reader to the conclusion that it related to events in 2002.....It appeared that no one who passed this story on actually bothered to read the story itself'.

It's not just computer-generated trades that lose money, of course. The Sunday Times reports that the $900m RAB Special Situations fund, which had lost 48% of its value as at the end of August, looks like being liquidated unless investors agree to a three-year lock-down. The fund is in trouble after fund manager Philip Richards took losing punts on Northern Rock ($89m), and A1 GP, a rival to Formula One ($152m).

Finally, The Financial  Times reports the The Prince of Wales injected some financial markets jargon into a speech he made last week at a Mansion House dinner in aid of his Rainforest Project. Demonstrating that he was in touch with his future subjects, and had kept up to date with non Rainforest-like issues, Charles said to his City audience: 'Probably you could be doing a lot more useful things. You may have had a lot of pressure on you to come here'.

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