FX is dead. Long live FX!

no, I actually agree with your points here. Washing out the dirt int he trench can only be good for the industry. There was definitely an imbalance of talent between financial "professionals" and the waiting industry and I am glad market forces are helping to adjust back a bit. But does it have to be capped at 125k (Deutsche). In all seriousness this is a wake-up call for the last soul on the sell-side (profitable), if those bells don't ring clear then I dont know what else. This is all getting too socialist for me, but hey, as you said, in all honesty this is probably nothing more than the big fat pendulum that is currently swinging back, thats how I see it. Years of exuberance, followed by hubris, followed by scams and market violations, followed by outcry, followed by regulations, followed by quasi-socialist markets, followed by "we gotta stop this, life is not fun anymore", and back ...;-)


Quote from Martinghoul:

I dunno, mate... In seriousness, I think that finance is overstaffed and people in finance (including myself) are overpaid. I think that as a result of a good decade (or two), we have grown lazy and complacent. As a result, I actually see current mkt conditions as a more or less natural reversion to some sort of a reasonable mean, where being profitable is actually difficult and isn't taken for granted any more. So, and pls feel free to shoot me down, I actually think that the current developments may be healthy in the long run. At any rate, this is just my Z$2c.
 
Sounds like it's become a tough game for the "trend-following herd."

There's always a place for shorter-term Support/Resistance trading, in my view.


Great article - thanks for posting.

-Chi
 
Quote from Tsing Tao:

DJ VINCENT CIGNARELLA: A Foreign-Exchange Trader's Lament
--The foreign-exchange markets have become unprofitable to trade
--I miss my MTV and my old FX market
--Central banks have corralled the FX markets

By Vincent Cignarella
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--The market isn't wrong, it is just stupid!
So said one veteran trader of the foreign-exchange markets...that is no doubt echoed by many others who are frustrated with the lack of trending activity in the foreign-currency markets recently.

More and more, those who are paid to play--seasoned veteran institutional foreign-exchange traders--are becoming disenchanted with a market that appears to them to be broken.

The EUR/USD is said to be so heavily optioned, locking the pair in a 1.3000-1.3500 range that it would take "the end of the world" to break to the downside. By the time you caught up with that it would be 500 points lower, making shorting the euro at 1.2500 useless, one trader moaned.

It has gotten so bad that even FX traders who have left the professional game and now trade their own money won't touch FX. They trade equities instead. As one former bank foreign-exchange manager put it, "I trade Apple stock; it is like what trading the Deutsche Mark was like years ago. FX, I won't touch it. Too much risk and too little reward."

What? He can't catch it unless it moves 500 points or around 15% and then it's too late?

Sure life is tough when you thought making money was placing a trade and then watching it move forever in one direction.

One day AAPL will no longer trend and then what?

He's been watching too much MTV and not enough focus on how to trade for a real living. Fx is brilliant every day
 
The buy-side approaches FX as this uber-volatile asset with tremendous depth until they see that realized-vol is in the single-digits and they can't make any cash on mean-reversion.

Market-making remains a huge profit-center as the entire desk is fronting every order over 100MM.

The successful guys in FX funds (Hathersage, FXC) treat it as an equity proxy and/or are vol-traders.
 
Quote from atticus:

The buy-side approaches FX as this uber-volatile asset with tremendous depth until they see that realized-vol is in the single-digits and they can't make any cash on mean-reversion.

Market-making remains a huge profit-center as the entire desk is fronting every order over 100MM.

The successful guys in FX funds (Hathersage, FXC) treat it as an equity proxy and/or are vol-traders.

That's where the 50 to 1 leverage comes in atty. :D

Low vol? No problem, just juice it with leverage baby!
 
Quote from Maverick74:

That's where the 50 to 1 leverage comes in atty. :D

Low vol? No problem, just juice it with leverage baby!

yeah, 50 pips is is an event to these guys.
 
I'm not defending the article, the people who commented in it, or trading FX. I just posted an article. To me, it seems like a bunch of woe over something that once brought in money and then dried up - because of central bank involvement - or so it claims.

How did I know Martinghoul would jump in? :)
 
Mr. know-it-all being everywhere, options I shut up, but dont claim big fx traders are in any way related to being options guys. Aside the pnl leftovers that are stuffed into barriers there is nothing whatsoever that could be related to option. Stick to your bread and butter but you look stupid making false claims and trying to look smart by pretending you know stuff you really should not open your mouth about. Your ego apparently makes you lose sight over your limitations.

Quote from atticus:

The buy-side approaches FX as this uber-volatile asset with tremendous depth until they see that realized-vol is in the single-digits and they can't make any cash on mean-reversion.

Market-making remains a huge profit-center as the entire desk is fronting every order over 100MM.

The successful guys in FX funds (Hathersage, FXC) treat it as an equity proxy and/or are vol-traders.
 
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