How Long Do You Think It Will Be?

[Joe Flacco]

No one is arguing more taxes increases GDP growth. However, Increasing debt since 2000 has not created enough growth to balance the budget either. In fact, deficit spending continued even after the George Bush tax cuts and the federal reserve cutting its FED funds rate down to 0.25%. And then the economy crashed, why? Too many people and too many institutions could not service their debts. Take a look at the debt side of people, companies, and governments since the last crash.

It's not more taxes increases GDP growth. It is GDP growth increases revenue / taxes.

 

[Randolph Kinney]

I am not concerned with intraday movements. That stuff happens all the time. So what? That's just the way the market is. You don't like it then you don't play the game.

You remind me of the story of the guy who plays at a crooked dice table. You play because it is the only game in town.

 

[Joe Flacco]

You remind me of the story of the guy who plays at a crooked dice table. You play because it is the only game in town.

You are not understanding the manipulation you are talking about and how it impacts the market. It is a non issue for most market participants.

 

[Joe Flacco]

Every fed rate decision market moves in one direction faking out and trapping people and then moves in the other direction. Sometimes it fakes people out again and goes back in the other direction. People say they are brilliant when they win and when they lose market is rigged and manipulation.

 

[Randolph Kinney]

I am not concerned with intraday movements. That stuff happens all the time. So what? That's just the way the market is. You don't like it then you don't play the game.

VIX Manipulation Costs Investors Billions, Whistle-Blower Says

February 12, 2018

A whistle-blower told U.S. regulators that a scheme to manipulate the VIX, the volatility gauge thrust into the spotlight last week during a wild trading session, costs investors hundreds of millions of dollars a month.

A Washington-based lawyer told the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission -- the nation’s top markets regulators -- in a letter Monday that his client found a flaw that allows traders “with sophisticated algorithms to move the VIX up or down by simply posting quotes on S&P options and without needing to physically engage in any trading or deploying any capital.” Billions in purportedly ill-gotten profits have been scooped up by “unethical electronic option market makers,” according to the letter.

The client wasn’t identified by name. He’s held “senior positions at some of the largest investment firms in the world,” according to the letter written by Jason Zuckerman of Zuckerman Law, who has appeared on Washingtonian magazine’s list of top whistle-blower lawyers in the nation’s capital.

Use of VIX derivatives has surged as money managers look for ways to hedge gains during the bull market. The gauge, which measures the cost of using S&P 500 options as insurance against stock swings, has gained widespread use especially since 2004 when Cboe began introducing futures and later on options tied to the index. Those products unleashed a new kind of hedging instrument into the financial system, allowing investors to make bets on market volatility.

The central role of the VIX was underscored last week, when it more than doubled in a single day, a record surge. Some exchange-traded products that held VIX futures plunged, and Credit Suisse Group AG decided to liquidate one of them. Billions of dollars were wiped out.

An Inventor of the VIX: ‘I Don’t Know Why These Products Exist’

“We contend that the liquidation of the VIX ETPs last week was not due solely to flaws in the design of these products, but instead was driven largely by a rampant manipulation of the VIX index,” according to the letter.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...-costs-investors-billions-whistle-blower-says

Joe, your billionaires are the hedge funds and their managers. They make billions manipulating the market. At whose expense? Suckers who play the game, hey Joe?

 

[Joe Flacco]

Joe, your billionaires are the hedge funds and their managers. They make billions manipulating the market. At whose expense? Suckers who play the game, hey Joe?

Do you even know what the VIX is? Those people been short VIX forever and thought it would never blow up. They thought wrong. They didn't lose their money because of manipulation.

 

[Randolph Kinney]

You are not understanding the manipulation you are talking about and how it impacts the market. It is a non issue for most market participants.

New Class Action Lawsuit Alleging Systemic Manipulation of Multi-Billion Dollar VIX Index Derivative Market Announced by Cohen Milstein

First-of-its-kind litigation seeks to uncover key players in widespread price rigging of VIX futures and options

March 12, 2018

CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--As controversy surrounding the CBOE Volatility Index (“VIX Index”) continues to grow, a new federal class action lawsuit filed late Friday alleges widespread manipulation of the VIX futures and options market, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in losses for investors across the country. The litigation, filed on behalf of investors damaged by this manipulation, is the first lawsuit concerning this market manipulation to allege violations of the Commodity Exchange Act, which prohibits market participants from improperly influencing the price of commodity futures. Furthermore, the named plaintiff and its counsel signaled their intention to issue a third-party subpoena to the Chicago Board Options Exchange, publisher of the VIX index and the only source of information for identifying the unnamed traders and transactions involved in the alleged market manipulation. The named plaintiff is being represented by Cafferty Clobes Meriwether & Sprengel LLP and Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC.

“The health of our financial system and the stability of our markets depends on the trustworthiness of their institutions,” said Michael Eisenkraft, co-counsel for the named plaintiff and putative class and a Partner in Cohen Milstein’s Securities Litigation and Investor Protection practice. “By manipulating the VIX derivative market, the defendants not only profited off their deceit at the expense of honest investors, but damaged the integrity of an entire industry.”

According to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, unnamed traders were able to rig the market for VIX futures and options by manipulating the process in which the contract’s settlement price – used to determine their value at settlement – was calculated at the time of the contract’s expiration. The lawsuit alleges this was done by aggressively transacting in a key determinant of a VIX derivative’s settlement value -- S&P 500 Index (SPX) options -- ahead of the settlement auction, thereby manipulating the value of VIX futures and options.

https://www.businesswire.com/news/h...Action-Lawsuit-Alleging-Systemic-Manipulation

I suggest you know nothing about the markets and players that rig trading in stocks, futures, options, bonds, interest rates, foreign exchange rates, commodities, credit default swaps, etc.

The are all rigged. They are all played by computer driven algorithms and hedging strategies by banks, hedge funds, George Soros, etc.

 

[Joe Flacco]

Those short VIX people probably made a lot of money over the years until it blew up.

 

[Joe Flacco]

New Class Action Lawsuit Alleging Systemic Manipulation of Multi-Billion Dollar VIX Index Derivative Market Announced by Cohen Milstein

First-of-its-kind litigation seeks to uncover key players in widespread price rigging of VIX futures and options

March 12, 2018

CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--As controversy surrounding the CBOE Volatility Index (“VIX Index”) continues to grow, a new federal class action lawsuit filed late Friday alleges widespread manipulation of the VIX futures and options market, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in losses for investors across the country. The litigation, filed on behalf of investors damaged by this manipulation, is the first lawsuit concerning this market manipulation to allege violations of the Commodity Exchange Act, which prohibits market participants from improperly influencing the price of commodity futures. Furthermore, the named plaintiff and its counsel signaled their intention to issue a third-party subpoena to the Chicago Board Options Exchange, publisher of the VIX index and the only source of information for identifying the unnamed traders and transactions involved in the alleged market manipulation. The named plaintiff is being represented by Cafferty Clobes Meriwether & Sprengel LLP and Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC.

“The health of our financial system and the stability of our markets depends on the trustworthiness of their institutions,” said Michael Eisenkraft, co-counsel for the named plaintiff and putative class and a Partner in Cohen Milstein’s Securities Litigation and Investor Protection practice. “By manipulating the VIX derivative market, the defendants not only profited off their deceit at the expense of honest investors, but damaged the integrity of an entire industry.”

According to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, unnamed traders were able to rig the market for VIX futures and options by manipulating the process in which the contract’s settlement price – used to determine their value at settlement – was calculated at the time of the contract’s expiration. The lawsuit alleges this was done by aggressively transacting in a key determinant of a VIX derivative’s settlement value -- S&P 500 Index (SPX) options -- ahead of the settlement auction, thereby manipulating the value of VIX futures and options.

https://www.businesswire.com/news/h...Action-Lawsuit-Alleging-Systemic-Manipulation

I suggest you know nothing about the markets and players that rig trading in stocks, futures, options, bonds, interest rates, foreign exchange rates, commodities, credit default swaps, etc.

The are all rigged. They are all played by computer driven algorithms and hedging strategies by banks, hedge funds, George Soros, etc.

Of course it's rigged! They lost all their money. They bet that volatility wouldn't return and they were wrong. They lost their money and now they are pointing fingers.

 

[Randolph Kinney]

You are not understanding the manipulation you are talking about and how it impacts the market. It is a non issue for most market participants.

Two traders arrested over alleged manipulation of more than 2,000 stocks

Joseph Taub and Elazar Shmalo allegedly used dozens of accounts at several brokerage firms in bouts of manipulative trading activity

Two New Jersey-based traders were arrested on Monday for allegedly manipulating prices of more than 2,000 New York Stock Exchange- and Nasdaq-listed shares resulting in more than $26 million in illegal profits over a two-year period.

Regulators, law enforcement, and the exchanges use technology to see, and track, manipulative trading that, in this case happened more than 23,000 times and often lasted just a few minutes. Joseph Taub, 37, of Clifton, New Jersey, and Elazar Shmalo, 21, of Passaic, New Jersey sometimes controlled at least 80% of the volume of a targeted stock and traded in several accounts simultaneously, the regulators said.

The scheme, says the Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. Attorney’s office in New Jersey, was sophisticated. Taub, a registered broker, and Shmalo, who is unemployed, allegedly coordinated trading in more than $10 billion worth of securities in dozens of brokerage accounts.

The complaint filed against Taub and Shmalo by the U.S. Attorney says they looked for companies with low trading volumes and then entered numerous trades using “helper” accounts that signaled false information to the market, artificially inflating their prices. Later they sold the shares in “winner” accounts at the artificially inflated prices after accumulating positions at lower prices.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/t...ipulation-of-more-than-2000-stocks-2016-12-12

You have no idea what goes on in the market trading, how much is being manipulated.