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How Æxecor’s programming error led to 28000 tons of coal delivered (2009)

34 points by michael_fine 11y ago

nmc 11y ago
OP, please append "(2009)" to the title.
tempestn 11y ago
If Santa leaves naughty children a lump of coal, this result seems about right for "Brad", who sounds like a great guy to be around.
_0nac 11y ago
Note to the uninitiated: All Daily WTF stories are more or less heavily disguised to protect the guilty and edited to read better, so they shouldn't be taken as gospel. In particular, there is no company called "Æxecor", although there is a famous commodity trader called Glencore...
ck2 11y ago
WTF would a physical order/delivery system be merged and running together with a virtual commodity system through the same API? And why would such a huge order worth seven digits or have zero verification? Whole story makes no sense to me and seems like just that, a story.
- blue1 11y ago
  Commodity futures are contracts that end in physical delivery (with a few exceptions). However, almost all the times the contracts are closed before the delivery date and nothing "real" happens (except an exchange of money). Still, all books on futures have some kind of warning about having your garden occupied by a delivery of pork bellies (or something else).
- URSpider94 11y ago
  Commodities are never virtual, always real. The ultimate source and sink for the commodities that are traded (oil, pork bellies, coal) are actual producers and consumers. Many traders do run warehouses or other storage facilities, so that excess commodities can be held and sold later at a higher price. It's not stupid that they are in the same system, it's in fact required. Also, I would expect that commodities traders place massive buy/sell orders all the time -- they make money on small deltas * large volume. The story may very well be apocryphal, but as other commenters have mentioned, there are many stories out there of traders failing to exit their position before the delivery date and having to "take delivery".
MrBuddyCasino 11y ago
Type safety, this is why its good having it. They could have verified the XML with a strict schema, but it was obviously not worth the effort to bother with an API where million dollar contracts are processed.

34 points by michael_fine 11y ago

nmc 11y ago

OP, please append "(2009)" to the title.

If Santa leaves naughty children a lump of coal, this result seems about right for "Brad", who sounds like a great guy to be around.

_0nac 11y ago

Note to the uninitiated: All Daily WTF stories are more or less heavily disguised to protect the guilty and edited to read better, so they shouldn't be taken as gospel. In particular, there is no company called "Æxecor", although there is a famous commodity trader called Glencore...

ck2 11y ago

WTF would a physical order/delivery system be merged and running together with a virtual commodity system through the same API? And why would such a huge order worth seven digits or have zero verification? Whole story makes no sense to me and seems like just that, a story.

blue1 11y ago
Commodity futures are contracts that end in physical delivery (with a few exceptions). However, almost all the times the contracts are closed before the delivery date and nothing "real" happens (except an exchange of money). Still, all books on futures have some kind of warning about having your garden occupied by a delivery of pork bellies (or something else).
URSpider94 11y ago
Commodities are never virtual, always real. The ultimate source and sink for the commodities that are traded (oil, pork bellies, coal) are actual producers and consumers. Many traders do run warehouses or other storage facilities, so that excess commodities can be held and sold later at a higher price. It's not stupid that they are in the same system, it's in fact required. Also, I would expect that commodities traders place massive buy/sell orders all the time -- they make money on small deltas * large volume. The story may very well be apocryphal, but as other commenters have mentioned, there are many stories out there of traders failing to exit their position before the delivery date and having to "take delivery".

MrBuddyCasino 11y ago

Type safety, this is why its good having it. They could have verified the XML with a strict schema, but it was obviously not worth the effort to bother with an API where million dollar contracts are processed.