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SEC's Schapiro Responds To Sen. Kaufman, Promises To Curb HFT Market Manipulation
The funny part:
"I can assure you the Commission takes very seriously credible allegations of market manipulation and, through its examinations and investigations, is actively enforcing the securities laws on an ongoing basis."
It's funny cause it's not true. We may, however, change our mind when the SEC issues a formal statement that it is pursuing enforcement and criminal action against the potential FDIC-based leaks on the BNY suspicious stock action last week.
The sad part:
"We will continue to use all tools at our disposal to aggressively pursue illegal market manipulation by high frequency traders and others."
Sad because it is true.
Here comes the public comment: something tells us Goldman's response is ready to be sent in via messenger squid.
"Next month we hope to seek public comment, through a concept release or similar document, on a range of issues relating to dark liquidity in all of its forms, as well as the impact of high frequency trading in our markets. Among other things, we are likely to seek input on the various strategies used by high frequency traders and any special trading advantages they may enjoy, including through co-location arrangements."
And to end on a funny note as well:
I am committed to pursuing the goal of improved intermarket surveillance as a means to strengthen our markets, deter and ferret out wrongdoing, and augment public confidence.
While nobody will actually believe this blast of fetid hot air until Schapiro actually catches someone operating south of Canal Street with their pants down and hands in the collocation cookie jar, Zero Hedge continues to firmly stand behind Senator Kaufman's campaign to bring some normalcy to what can only be classified as a completely broken and thoroughly manipulated market.
In the meantime, since Mary Schapiro is in dire need of constant external feedback, the (202) 551-2100 number should be put to good use.
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coming up live NY time at 11:15am Obama on how TARP can be redirected/diverted to create or save jobs
http://www.bloomberg.com/streams/video/LiveBTV200.asx
http://c-span.org/Watch/Media/2009/12/08/HP/R/26960/New+Policy+May+Switc...
Text of speech
http://c-span.org/pdf/wh120809_obama.pdf
That sure is a load of condescending crap she sent back to Kaufman. Maybe he should try a different agency like the FBI to go in and start unplugging front running boxes. It's pretty clear that SEC/Mary is stonewalling on this request.
Agreed. The letter is boilerplate. It didn't address any one of Kaufman's very specific proposals. She said, in effect, we're going to study the issue on our own schedule, and that schedule is none of your business. It's a remarkable - truly remarkable - kiss off. If Kaufman has the will he should launch a Congressional investigation of the SEC's market surveillance and market structure blunders in the last decade. It is a failed agency, and arrogant about it.
Nothing from her highness on the insider trading on NYB however... Sheila must be taking her breakfast of champions right about now - fistfuls of oxycontin, 10 mg valium and percocet all washed down with a nice bracing bloody "mary".
"We will continue to use all tools at our disposal to aggressively pursue illegal market manipulation by high frequency traders and others."
The key word is "illegal" and as long as they claim they're studying HFT and the market participants who practice HFT, they will put enforcement action on the back burner. If in 1 or 2 years they decide it is in fact illegal, they will then enforce, but not retroactively, because they were uncertain at the time and thus can't hold anyone accountable when they couldn't give clear guidance.
This is a well worn path for government agencies with politically appointed leadership who don't wish to enforce the laws. Pretend to be concerned, pretend to investigate and pretend to be proactive.
The bottom line? More of the same. This won't be stopped until so many people are in the game it's no longer profitable for the big boys. By then, they will have migrated to something else and that's when it will be declared illegal, not before.
Huh, I took that like to mean that they would actively pursue illegal market manipulation as their goal, via allowing HFT. It's clear they all want the manipulation, after all if stocks were low then people at the SEC would be under a microscope, but the American people are not calling for their skulls to be piled at our collective feet because the market is "up"
The SEC is like every other Gov regulatory body, it exists to attack the little guy and give the big and well connected a free pass and the air of legitimacy. Got to love a little Fascism in the morning!
Yeah, the squid and their lackeys get a pass today.
Ye of little faith...but absolute clarity!
Right now, I'm sure Ms. Schapiro's task force is drafting a stern letter to all HFT players soliciting their opinions on what regulations they want and don't want. As we all know, this is the best source of regulatory ideas.
Shapiro: Therefore, earlier this year, I set up an inter-division task force among the Commission staff to develop proposals for establishing an intermarket audit trail.
Excuse me? You mean there is no intermarket audit trail right now?
shell games (excerpt from the Obama's jobs speech)
In other words, the banks tapped us out. Maybe they can hand out cheese again.
All dogs are animals. Not all animals are dogs.
Identify what, specifically, is detrimental to the markets within the HUGE umbrella of HFT and work to eliminate that.
Some brokers in the pits in the 1980s front ran their clients' orders. Should they have banned floor trading?
I take back my comments about Ms. Shapiro's being busy with the holidays and Christmas shopping. But HFT? C'mon this is so last spring.
This only leaves one insane conclusion:
The FDIC is leaking advance notice, Bair, someone to finance it, Ben, and someone to cove it up, Schapiro.
There are two sides in this fight--the giant Wall Street interests and then the interests of Main Street-- the taxpayers, the citizens. Are the citizens the ones who are keeping Mary in the SEC? No.
The reason Mary is regulating and investigating at the SEC is because the financial captains like her. She would be gone in a second, if they didn’t. Anybody who deals with the big investment banks and has survived as many administrations as has our Mary—of Barack Obama, of Bill Clinton, of George H. W. Bush, and of Ronald Reagan, is there to serve the Wall Street titans, not Main Street.
These people who use the government for their own benefit are like an infection. They not only infect the government, but every day they deal the public another one-two punch—such as yesterday’s formal EPA announcement to counter evidence of massive fraud in climate change findings on the cusp of meetings in Copenhagen to discuss an international climate treaty, that carbon dioxide is a dangerous pollutant and will be regulated--keeping alive the elites' battle for global governance.
The way to solve America’s self-government problem is surgical removal of the organism that’s causing the problem. I suggest that this organism, this cancer, is the thing that has tipped representative government to the breaking point—we must tip it back to where the people have influence. This organism is a body of practices and laws that has legalized the plundering of the public’s purse. We need to change lobbyist laws that give freedom to the lobbyists to walk in and out of the government and get whatever they want. It is changing how political parties operate at both the state and national levels. And it is investigating and punishing members of Congress who use their offices for personal benefit. There should be severe penalties if a congressman is caught abusing his office for gain, i.e., a lifetime cutoff to engage in any activity connected to government.
Such would remove the organism that is preying on representative government.
As to Mary, in October 1993, says Wikipedia: Schapiro gave a speech in Lugano, Switzerland, "The Derivatives Revolution and the World Financial System," concerning potential regulation of the unregulated derivatives market in which she cited "the benefits to financial innovation that may result from a more flexible regulatory paradigm," and stated that she was "not convinced that consolidated regulatory supervision of securities firms and their affiliates is necessary or appropriate at this time."
On June 17, 2009, Bernard Madoff, in an interview by the SEC inspector general David Kotz, said that Mary Schapiro was a "dear friend," although she "probably thinks, 'I wish I never knew this guy.'"
Of how many more Madoffs is Mary a "dear friend"?
SEC theme song
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waacof2saZw
damn shame that kaufman will be replaced by the most egregious case of nepotism--beau biden--that we have seen for some time
you should all consider donating to mike castle's campaign for senate to avert this miscarriage. come on zero hedgies, i know there are some deep pockets out there...