Ticking News

In this “high frequency trading” computers make the decision to initiate orders based on information that is received electronically, before human traders are even aware of the information. [...] In electronic financial markets, algorithmic trading or automated trading, also known as algo trading, black-box trading, high-frequency trading or robo trading, is the use of computer programs for entering trading orders with the computer algorithm deciding on aspects of the order such as the timing, price, or quantity of the order, or in many cases initiating the order without human intervention. [1]

The media recently flipped the floodlights on the new black box de jour: High Frequency Trading (HFT). [2]

A recent story in Advanced Trading goes after some of the minutae of High Frequency Trading and provides a glimpse of the total value that HFT may provide to behemoth PT powerhouses such as Goldman Sachs. [3]

If the calls I am getting from headhunters are any indication, the hot area now is high frequency trading. [4]

High-frequency trading, long an obscure corner of the market, has leapt into the spotlight this year. [...] Concerns that some traders are taking advantage of less fleet-footed investors has drawn the attention of regulators and members of Congress. [...] They hunt for “signals,” such as the movement of interest rates, that indicate which way parts of the market may move in short periods. [5]

High Frequency Traders claim to be market makers — a necessary component to the auction process. [2]

The article presents a very valuable perspective on just why HFT is so critical these days, especially when cash traders go for 6 hour Starbucks breaks between 10 am and 3:30 pm: “high frequency trading firms, which represent approximately 2% of the 20,000 or so trading firms operating in the US markets today, account for 73% of all US equity trading volume. [3]

I have some experience in this area because I did some work for a major CBOE market maker back in 2000-2002. [...] Only a handful of people who work closely with the exchanges truly understand HFT, so I asked for some color from my friend and top pro quant trader Fari Hamzei from Hamzei Analytics. [2]

And as the market keeps going up day in and day out, regardless of the deteriorating economic conditions, it is just these HFT’s that determine the overall market direction, usually without fundamental or technical reason. [3]

The high frequency trader is basically a stand-alone market maker; he is sitting there to provide liquidity to others. [4]

The program trade at the NYSE would be pre-programmed into a computer to enter the order automatically into the NYSE’s electronic order routing system at a time when the futures price and the stock index were far enough apart to make a profit. [1]

Sources:
[1] Algorithmic trading - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[2] Demystifying High Frequency Trading | Wall St. Cheat Sheet
[3] Zero Hedge: Goldman’s $4 Billion High Frequency Trading Wildcard
[4] Rick Bookstaber: The Arms Race in High Frequency Trading
[5] What’s Behind High-Frequency Trading - WSJ.com

Michael Scott Speicher (July 12, 1957′ January 17, 1991) was a United States Navy pilot who was shot down during the Gulf War. [1]

WASHINGTON - Nearly a year after the fall of Baghdad, the Navy has yet to find evidence to change its position that F-18 fighter pilot Michael Scott Speicher, shot down on the opening night of the 1991 Gulf War (news - web sites), was at one time in Iraqi captivity, the Navy’s top admiral said Tuesday. [2]

On Sunday, August 2nd 2009, one chapter in the First Gulf War of 1991 was brought to a close as the Military released the statement that a body found in the Anbar Province of Iraq, by Al Asad Air Base, was positively identified as those of Captain Michael Scott Speicher. [3]

As a hearse carried the remains of Navy aviator Michael Scott Speicher through the streets of Jacksonville Friday, thousands of people lined the roadways to pay their respects to Speicher as he returned home 18 years after his F/A 18 was shot down on the first night of the first Gulf War. [4]

Captain Speicher was shot down flying a combat mission in an F/A-18 Hornet over west-central Iraq on January 17th, 1991 during Operation Desert Storm. [5]

At the time of his deployment to the Iraq theater, Scott and Joanne had a 3-year-old daughter and 1-year-old son. [1]

Iraq (news - web sites) has maintained all along that Speicher was killed in the crash. [2]

How a Navy pilot wound up listed as killed in action during the Gulf War and why he may still be alive. [...] In the minutes leading up to the shoot down, other pilots in the strike group, perhaps Speicher himself, obtained radar contact on an Iraqi fighter closing the group. [6]

The family can rest knowing that his body has been found and he will be returned to the United States for a proper burial. [3]

Funeral arrangement have been finalized for Captain Scott Speicher, the local navy pilot who’s body had been missing since the start of the first Iraq War, 18 years ago. [7]

Saddam’s government had always insisted that Speicher died in the Jan. 17, 1991, crash. [...] Michael Scott Speicher was declared killed in action hours after his plane went down. [8]

His fellow pilots didn’t want to believe that Scott Speicher had been killed over Iraq, but the American government made a quick judgment that sealed his fate. [9]

Michael Scott Speicher, were brought to Naval Air Station (NAS) Jacksonville after being found in Iraq after 18 years. [7]

Sources:
[1] Scott Speicher - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[2] Scott Speicher
[3] Scott Speicher
[4] Tampa man recalls his friend Scott Speicher
[5] Michael Scott Speicher, Captain, United States Navy
[6] Cmdr. Robert E. Stumpf on Scott Speicher & Iraq on National …
[7] Bio, Speicher, Michael S.
[8] Tribute to LCDR Michael Speicher, USN POW/MIA
[9] AII POW-MIA - Michael Scott Speicher

Horace Kephart is best-known for his role in raising public support for what became the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and as the author of two non-fiction books that have become classics. [1]

Horace Kephart: Revealing an Enigma is presented by Hunter Library Special Collections and the Mountain Heritage Center. [2]

Horace Kephart (1862-1931) was an American travel writer and librarian, best known as the author of Our Southern Highlanders, about his life in the Great Smoky Mountains of western North Carolina. [3]

Horace Kephart, a pivotal figure in the history of Great Smoky Mountains National Park, is featured in Ken Burns’ new PBS series about the national parks, America’s Best Idea. [4]

Since my great-grandfather, Horace Kephart, played a pivotal role in the creation of the Greak Smoky Mountains National Park, he, along with his good friend, photographer George Masa, will be featured in the stories told. [5]

Trained as a librarian, Kephart achieved national recognition during his years as director of the Mercantile Library in St. Louis, Missouri, from 1890 to 1903. [2]

The photograph here is of Horace Kephart’s son, George Kephart, my father’s late father. [5]

Later in life Kephart campaigned for the establishment of a national park in the Great Smoky Mountains, and lived long enough to know that the park would be created. [3]

When he reached the Smokies, Kephart moved into an abandoned cabin on a tributary of Hazel Creek in North Carolina. [...] It was a remote area even by local standards of the time, but it fit his love for hiking, camping, fishing, hunting, and living off the land. [1]

Although completed in 1929, two years before the author’s death, the novel was never published until now. [...] There Kephart befriended his independent and self-reliant neighbors and pursued his passions for hiking, camping, fishing, hunting, and generally living off the land. [...] Smoky Mountain Magic’s fictional story takes place during the summer of 1925, mostly along the Deep Creek watershed in the Great Smoky Mountains, but also in a thinly-disguised Bryson City (called Kittuwa) and the Cherokee Indian Reservation. [4]

While living in what was already one of the largest cities in the nation, Kephart began indulging in outdoor life through camping and hunting trips. [...] Kephart, who was personally modest and rarely sought the limelight, nevertheless used his abilities and reputation on behalf of the movement to create a Great Smoky Mountains National Park. [2]

Sources:
[1] Lost in Time: A Manuscript From Horace Kephart, A Driver …
[2] Horace Kephart: Revealing an Enigma
[3] Horace Kephart - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[4] Horace Kephart | Great Smoky Mountains National Park Official …
[5] Beth Kephart Books: Ken Burns, Horace Kephart, and an …

View company contact information for The Lizzie McGuire Movie on IMDbPro. [1]

The film based on ABC’s hugely popular tween/young adult TV show Lizzie McGuire, The Lizzie McGuire Movie, features an appropriately playful and romantic mix of teen pop — including several songs by Hilary Duff (Lizzie herself) — dance-pop, and ballads that reflects the movie’s vacation-in-Rome plot. [2]

This, I swear, is a backward-compliment way of saying that Duff’s baby-bombshell exuberance is the only reason you keep watching The Lizzie McGuire Movie through its juiced-up, synthesized din. [3]

Disney’s “The Lizzie McGuire Movie” serves up the comic foibles of lovable Lizzie McGuire and her pals Gordo, Kate, and Ethan, who all pack their bags and plan to live la dolce vita while on a class trip to Italy. [4]

Accident-prone Lizzie McGuire (Hillary Duff) gets the adventure of a lifetime when she takes a two-week school trip to Rome following her junior high school graduation. [5]

I have since heard from our household’s eighth-grader-in-residence that Duff, who is actually 15, did look kind of gawky a couple of years back when the Disney Channel began transmitting “Lizzie McGuire” through cable boxes across America. [3]

Her wish is to sail smoothly through school (as revealed by her animated alter-ego), but is seemingly answered immediately with a handsome Italian media star 17-year-old, named Paolo, who greets her. [6]

The slower tracks, like Paolo & Isabella’s “What Dreams Are Made Of (Ballad Version)” and LMNT ’s “Open Your Eyes (To Love)” just don’t have any of the funky sense of fun or sensitivity that makes Lizzie McGuire so popular; they’re sappy instead of moving. [2]

The Lizzie McGuire Movie is a 2003 Walt Disney comedy film based on the Disney Channel show Lizzie McGuire which was released on May 2, 2003, by Walt Disney Pictures. [6]

Lizzie McGuire, of Disney Channel fame, graduates from junior high and finds herself in Rome, Italy. [7]

He turns out to be a famous European pop star named Paolo (Yani Gellman), and Lizzie looks just like his also famous girlfriend, Isabella (Hilary Duff), except their hair is a different color (Lizzie is a blonde and Isabella is a brunette). [...] She plainly listens to nobody and even calls Lizzie’s best guy friend, Gordo (Adam Lamberg) “a sneaky brown-noser with a hidden agenda”, and it goes downhill from there. [6]

On her first day in the Eternal City, Lizzie meets Paolo (Yani Gellman), half of a famous Italian pop duo. [5]

The film stars Hilary Duff, Adam Lamberg, and Yani Gellman. [6]

Once there, Lizzie is mistaken for Isabella (who is part of an Italian pop duo) and begins to fall for Paolo (Isabella’s handsome Italian pop star former boyfriend). [4]

Sources:
[1] Lizzie McGuire Movie, The (2003) - IMDb
[2] The Lizzie McGuire Movie: Album review and songs from Answers.com
[3] The Lizzie McGuire Movie Critic Reviews
[4] Walt Disney Records - Soundtracks - The Lizzie McGuire Movie …
[5] The Lizzie McGuire Movie Movie Reviews, Pictures - Rotten …
[6] The Lizzie McGuire Movie - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[7] The Lizzie McGuire Movie - Meets Paolo | Spike.com

ABC further spins the numbers for the week of September 21-27. [1]

Claire is having trouble with her own family, especially with her husband Phil, who thinks he can be hip with his three kids. [2]

ABC has a few shows they will be rolling out. [3]

Jay has just recently married his younger, Colombian wife, Gloria, but he’s having trouble keeping up with her and her son Manny. [2]

They’re three totally different versions of what constitutes a contemporary American family, but all three families are happy, loving and operational, even if they aren’t the Cleavers or the Nelsons. [4]

Claire’s husband, Phil, tries so hard to be the cool dad. [3]

Ty Burrell, he of “Out of Practice” and “Back to You,” has a face for drama, timing for comedy and when he performs a number from “High School Musical” or attempts to showcase his knowledge of texting abbreviations, it’s an inspired kind of deadpan alchemy. [4]

The CW for instance will repeat the openers of its three new series not once, but twice while NBC’s “Community” will re-air its pilot on E!. [1]

Phil is determined to help Luke prove he is responsible enough to have a new bike; Jay and Manny have some father and son time. [5]

As he was working on his own review of “Modern Family,” My Buddy Sepinwall asked if this was a good place to use “the Tolstoy quote.” [4]

Modern Family (formerly known as My American Family) is an American single camera mockumentary comedy, which premiered on ABC on September 23, 2009. [6]

Elizabeth Banks will also guest star in the same episode as Mitchell and Cameron’s best girlfriend, Sal. [1]

Despite stiff premiere competition at 9/8c, Glee pulled 6.6 million viewers, a loss of only 5 percent week-to-week. [...] Although CBS’ Criminal Minds won the 9/8c timeslot in overall viewers (15.4 million), the ABC comedy combo was the most-watched in the key demographics. [7]

The half-hour series, which was created by Christopher Lloyd and Steven Levitan, is produced by Fox Television Studios. [6]

Sources:
[1] Shows A-Z - modern family on abc | TheFutonCritic.com
[2] Modern Family - TV.com
[3] Modern Family on ABC: New Fall Television Comedy Starring Ed …
[4] TV Review: ABCs Modern Family - HitFix.com
[5] ABC.com - Modern Family - Home
[6] Modern Family - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[7] Modern Family on ABC - Watch Full Modern Family Episodes …