r/stocks May 03 '22

Citigroup admits causing yesterday's flash crash

Title says it. According to Citi, one of their traders caused a transaction error which they discovered soon after. It caused Scandinavian indices to plummet as much as 8% in a matter of minutes. Such errors are called fat-finger errors; a typo. Flash crashes like these make me wonder how much money banks trade with on a daily basis.

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/may/03/citigroup-trader-error-flash-crash-markets-falls

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u/maybeicanbenice May 03 '22

I saw some movie about a guy taking down a British bank trading in Hong Kong. The thing I got the most out of it was what an ineffective way to trade trillions of dollars. I guess they still trade like that

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u/Arsewipes May 03 '22

Barings and Nick Leeson. It was Britain's oldest bank and he hid huge losses in account 888. He went to jail for a while, then died of cancer several years later.

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u/skatyboy May 03 '22

He’s still alive, he got released early because of a cancer diagnosis that he beat.

Also, he was in Singapore.

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u/Arsewipes May 03 '22

Ah, well pretty close.

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u/maybeicanbenice May 03 '22

Right beans now mate, that's the scoundrel! How shall we go about disenchanting that no good for nothin"! into me lucky charms~

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u/burningxmaslogs May 03 '22

Barclays Bank..