6 ms·

The Robots Are Coming for Wall Street

46 points by Futurebot 11y ago

cylinder 11y ago
The newest clickbait trend is to call software "robots."
- caminante 11y ago
  Haha! Though, in the pantheon of co-opted words, it's not on the level of "drones" or "hoverboards."
- taurath 11y ago
  Its culturally appropriate though, given how many former industrial jobs were replaced by them.
robocaptain 11y ago
As someone who has watched class after class of analysts put together 50-page pitch books of which <5 will be read, the day of the robots cannot come soon enough.
- AnimalMuppet 11y ago
  I don't know. A robot might put together a 500-page pitch book, because the robot doesn't understand the concept of "boredom".
  - vicda 11y ago
    But when that pitch is being interpreted by another program wouldn't that make the most sense?
    - AnimalMuppet 11y ago
      Ah, I hadn't considered that aspect of it. I was presuming that the robot was writing for humans...
applecore 11y ago
Is this a submarine PR piece for Kensho? The company is mentioned over thirty times in the article.
- CyberDildonics 11y ago
  Half of hacker news is submarine pieces, it's ridiculous.
  - johansch 11y ago
    I think this is because tech news sucks at the moment, rather than people submitting stuff that pitches their product. There is just very little independent quality tech journalism being done at the moment.
    - caminante 11y ago
      This quote from the article talks directly to your point: Nadler closed his laptop. The whole process had taken just a few minutes. Generating a similar query without automation, he said, ‘‘would have taken days, probably 40 man-hours, from people who were making an average of $350,000 to $500,000 a year.’’
  - dang 11y ago
    Why don't you post some stories that aren't?
- Futurebot 11y ago
  The WSJ and Forbes ones were too short (Forbes one was OK, quality-wise, but too ad-laden.) This was the best of the bunch, and if it describes a real phenomenon (the multiple articles convinced me it did) then it's worth sharing, even if it's a bit pitchy. Edit: I was under the impression the NYT flags its sponsored content in any case.
chollida1 11y ago
I guess this is a PR piece? Lots of companies are in this space, you could argue this is what Palantir does. It used to be before computers that someone had to go to the microfiche to pull the time series data required to analyze what the markets did during certain periods. Nowadays Bloomberg or Tompson Reuters will do this for you without requiring you to even start excel. So I guess "robots" are coming in the same way that computers previously came for data entry and retrieval people. The analyst position has been shrinking since 2008 from my experience. This makes sense when you consider the Investment banking funnel. - 1000's of analysts get hired on 2 year terms each year. This is often why you'll see people who spent 2 year stints with Investment banks and then left. It's really hard to get hired as an Associate and the analyst position doesn't really carry anywhere near the "prestige" of being a full time Associate. It's close to the equivalent of saying you did a co-op term with Google. You did work for Google but you were never a full time employee who went through the entire interview process and were deemed worthy. - 10%-20% become full time positions (Associates) after a couple of years. - 10% of those become VP's after 3-4 years. Most people cap out here. - 10% of those become Managing directors(there are several tiers here, and you'll run a specific book and have your own team and pnl if you get this far). Since investment banks have been shrinking head count its not surprising that they are looking for ways to decrease the number of analysts they hire. It's the one position where people don't really give it any respect. I've never actually seen their product but if it works they'll have no problem making money. The biggest single expense most funds I talk to have, is building out the technical infrastructure to aggregate data in an easy to use method. Jim Simmons of Renaissance Technologies fame was quoted as saying their single most important piece of technology was their back-testing and data aggregation framework.
- caminante 11y ago
  In learning about IB funnel, I've noticed that almost everyone KNOWS these stats yet everyone thinks he'll be the exception. To your points and for anyone interested about IB, here's a lecture[1] (part 3/5) by Anton Kreil -- a trader and TV personality in the UK. He walks through the IB funnel on the secondary markets side, including the org chart, the "catches" in compensation, cost of living trade-offs, etc. The shoulder videos are worth watching as he discusses the structural decline at IB (secondary markets side) due to regulation and offers suggestions like learning programming if you want to survive as a trader ;-). [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OReolQm34TQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OReolQm34TQ
ImTalking 11y ago
Good article. Although the danger is that, if everyone is using this type of software, this creates a herd mentality whereby everyone is doing the same thing. The stock market only works correctly if there is diversity and independence of opinion... things that are slowly decreasing in this instant-access global wired world. To me, this means that there will always be a place for the out-of-the-box thinker.
infinite8s 11y ago
Such sophisticated back-end technology, and sadly the interface still requires mashing ctrl-R repeatedly to see the latest updates! Having worked in financial technology, I've seen this lack of consideration on human-computer interaction first hand. Much of the information displays are not much more sophisticated than the ticker tapes of the 80 and 90s. Edit: On an unrelated note, I'm surprised that their reports take so long after the announcement. 5 minutes after the release most of the information has already been priced into the markets.

46 points by Futurebot 11y ago

cylinder 11y ago

The newest clickbait trend is to call software "robots."

caminante 11y ago
Haha! Though, in the pantheon of co-opted words, it's not on the level of "drones" or "hoverboards."
taurath 11y ago
Its culturally appropriate though, given how many former industrial jobs were replaced by them.

robocaptain 11y ago

As someone who has watched class after class of analysts put together 50-page pitch books of which <5 will be read, the day of the robots cannot come soon enough.

AnimalMuppet 11y ago
I don't know. A robot might put together a 500-page pitch book, because the robot doesn't understand the concept of "boredom".
- vicda 11y ago
  But when that pitch is being interpreted by another program wouldn't that make the most sense?
  - AnimalMuppet 11y ago
    Ah, I hadn't considered that aspect of it. I was presuming that the robot was writing for humans...

applecore 11y ago

Is this a submarine PR piece for Kensho? The company is mentioned over thirty times in the article.

CyberDildonics 11y ago
Half of hacker news is submarine pieces, it's ridiculous.
- johansch 11y ago
  I think this is because tech news sucks at the moment, rather than people submitting stuff that pitches their product. There is just very little independent quality tech journalism being done at the moment.
  - caminante 11y ago
    This quote from the article talks directly to your point: Nadler closed his laptop. The whole process had taken just a few minutes. Generating a similar query without automation, he said, ‘‘would have taken days, probably 40 man-hours, from people who were making an average of $350,000 to $500,000 a year.’’
- dang 11y ago
  Why don't you post some stories that aren't?
Futurebot 11y ago
The WSJ and Forbes ones were too short (Forbes one was OK, quality-wise, but too ad-laden.) This was the best of the bunch, and if it describes a real phenomenon (the multiple articles convinced me it did) then it's worth sharing, even if it's a bit pitchy. Edit: I was under the impression the NYT flags its sponsored content in any case.

chollida1 11y ago

I guess this is a PR piece? Lots of companies are in this space, you could argue this is what Palantir does. It used to be before computers that someone had to go to the microfiche to pull the time series data required to analyze what the markets did during certain periods. Nowadays Bloomberg or Tompson Reuters will do this for you without requiring you to even start excel. So I guess "robots" are coming in the same way that computers previously came for data entry and retrieval people. The analyst position has been shrinking since 2008 from my experience. This makes sense when you consider the Investment banking funnel. - 1000's of analysts get hired on 2 year terms each year. This is often why you'll see people who spent 2 year stints with Investment banks and then left. It's really hard to get hired as an Associate and the analyst position doesn't really carry anywhere near the "prestige" of being a full time Associate. It's close to the equivalent of saying you did a co-op term with Google. You did work for Google but you were never a full time employee who went through the entire interview process and were deemed worthy. - 10%-20% become full time positions (Associates) after a couple of years. - 10% of those become VP's after 3-4 years. Most people cap out here. - 10% of those become Managing directors(there are several tiers here, and you'll run a specific book and have your own team and pnl if you get this far). Since investment banks have been shrinking head count its not surprising that they are looking for ways to decrease the number of analysts they hire. It's the one position where people don't really give it any respect. I've never actually seen their product but if it works they'll have no problem making money. The biggest single expense most funds I talk to have, is building out the technical infrastructure to aggregate data in an easy to use method. Jim Simmons of Renaissance Technologies fame was quoted as saying their single most important piece of technology was their back-testing and data aggregation framework.

caminante 11y ago
In learning about IB funnel, I've noticed that almost everyone KNOWS these stats yet everyone thinks he'll be the exception. To your points and for anyone interested about IB, here's a lecture[1] (part 3/5) by Anton Kreil -- a trader and TV personality in the UK. He walks through the IB funnel on the secondary markets side, including the org chart, the "catches" in compensation, cost of living trade-offs, etc. The shoulder videos are worth watching as he discusses the structural decline at IB (secondary markets side) due to regulation and offers suggestions like learning programming if you want to survive as a trader ;-). [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OReolQm34TQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OReolQm34TQ

ImTalking 11y ago

Good article. Although the danger is that, if everyone is using this type of software, this creates a herd mentality whereby everyone is doing the same thing. The stock market only works correctly if there is diversity and independence of opinion... things that are slowly decreasing in this instant-access global wired world. To me, this means that there will always be a place for the out-of-the-box thinker.

infinite8s 11y ago

Such sophisticated back-end technology, and sadly the interface still requires mashing ctrl-R repeatedly to see the latest updates! Having worked in financial technology, I've seen this lack of consideration on human-computer interaction first hand. Much of the information displays are not much more sophisticated than the ticker tapes of the 80 and 90s. Edit: On an unrelated note, I'm surprised that their reports take so long after the announcement. 5 minutes after the release most of the information has already been priced into the markets.