Who Gets News Alerts First? And How

Clubber Lang said:
BB and other news services are almost worthless for humans now.
Before you can read the first word of the press release, the bots have scanned the entire story and are firing off orders to buy/sell.
News trading used to be a windfall if you were fast to react, that game is all but over now.
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As someone pointed out above, I know that hackers have used this angle in the past, ....but geez, you would think it would be happening several times per day. People out to trickf*ck the "bots".

I mean this is not like breaking into the State Dept's computers..... I guess this beguiles my naivety in this area, but I wonder why we are not hearing about this every day. Maybe we will soon huh? Seems obvious to me.
 
vanzandt said:
As someone pointed out above, I know that hackers have used this angle in the past, ....but geez, you would think it would be happening several times per day. People out to trickf*ck the "bots".

I mean this is not like breaking into the State Dept's computers..... I guess this beguiles my naivety in this area, but I wonder why we are not hearing about this every day. Maybe we will soon huh? Seems obvious to me.
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I kinda wish someone would actually. Teach those f*ckers a lesson and level an already tilted playing field a little. Its like the hedge funds that are buying satellite imagery now to game retail earnings. If you got the bucks...you can rig the game in your favor. It is what it is I guess. One of these days however, .....all this reliance on technology is gonna bite them in the ass. You can mark the post.
 
JackRab said:
Where did you pull those numbers of? I think a Bloomberg Terminal is about 3k per month...
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I got my numbers from the sales teams of the respective providers. The price you're quoted usually depends on your AUM (amongst other factors), but I strongly doubt you'll ever be quoted less than ~$10,000/month for one of the major stock news full feeds (I am talking about the content-generating ones, such as DJ, Thomson Reuters, Bloomberg, etc., rather than ones that just forward press releases). If anyone knows otherwise, then please let me know.

A Bloomberg Terminal is all but useless to algorithmic traders, IMO. The services I investigated are full-feed products -- they are not giving info in request to a human clicking on something with a mouse button; rather, you get all their info, as it's generated, streamed to your machine (for HFT's, that means an exchange co-located server), with minimal latency. This is clearly what many of these HFT's are using in order to pick off everyone else in response to breaking news.
 
vanzandt said:
If you got the bucks...you can rig the game in your favor. It is what it is I guess. One of these days however, .....all this reliance on technology is gonna bite them in the ass. You can mark the post.
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I'm sure you're right -- I'm told by a reliable source that most HFT's don't really like it when some new tech like that comes along, because it means they have to invest in it just to compete with the other HFT's. So projects such as that giant microwave tower they're trying to build in southern England are really just gigantic eyesores.
http://media.efinancialnews.com/story/2016-02-18/ash-kent-residents-reject-hft-tower
 
Clubber Lang said:
Before you can read the first word of the press release, the bots have scanned the entire story and are firing off orders to buy/sell.
News trading used to be a windfall if you were fast to react, that game is all but over now.
More...

I wonder how many times bots misinterpret the news, causing gigantic losses.
 
vanzandt said:
I was just now watching CXW, I had the intraday chart up, and at 12:41 EST, it dives. The news was more comments from DHS. No biggie, but here's my question. I didn't get an alert, and it didn't hit wires until 12:49.... somebody got that news 8 minutes sooner. How? And who do they use? Are retail schmucks getting screwed here? I already know the answer to that,...... but I'd still like to know who they are using.
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To all who try to use news to trade: News FOLLOWS price, not the other way around. If you are watching price movement and there is a big move, wait a few minutes, and several news services will publish stories about the stock you are watching. Note that the stories occur AFTER the move, not before it.

Here's how that happens: Nobody got the news early.

1) The price moves.
2) Writers for news organizations see it.
3) The writers call the company and other sources.
4) The writers write their stories. They are very fast.
5) Stories hit the wires.
6) Schmucks who attempt to trade "the news" get in or out late, as always.

Bottom line: Trading the news doesn't work.
 
Steve Alexander said:
News FOLLOWS price, not the other way around. about the stock you are watching. Note that the stories occur AFTER the move, not before it.
Here's how that happens: Nobody got the news early.

1) The price moves.
2) Writers for news organizations see it.
3) The writers call the company and other sources.
4) The writers write their stories. They are very fast.
5) Stories hit the wires.
6) Schmucks who attempt to trade "the news" get in or out late, as always.

Bottom line: Trading the news doesn't work.
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^
1) The price moves.
2) Writers for news organizations see it.
3) The writers call the company and other sources.
4) The writers write their stories. They are very fast.
5) Stories hit the wires.
6) Schmucks who attempt to trade "the news" get in or out late, as always.

Bottom line: Trading the news doesn't work.

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^

I disagree.

The price moves because the companies release earnings reports that may agree or disagree with analyst expectations. Which is reported on the news wires. Then traders react to the news.

The price does not move by itself. It does not have consciousness.

Tesla stock dropped $11 +/- on Thursday when their rocket blew up on the launchpad. It blew up from static electricity or something else that ignited the fuel while it was being loaded. Then the stock moved...after the explosion was reported. The stock movement did not cause the explosion.

When WalMart and Best Buy released their earnings recently and their stock rose it was a reaction to the news release. The stock did not manifest a soul and motivate traders around the world to buy more WM and BBY and sell Target and MCD prior to the earnings report.

Stock prices move on news releases from the companies as well as remarks from independent journalists and analysts. And attentive traders make decisions based on those early remarks. If the swings are big, then the major networks report them.

Trading the news works, if you trade fast enough.
 
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I don't bother trying to catch the news. Even if I get news before everyone else I wouldn't know how to discern how it will affect the stock. Best leave it to the professionals.
 
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