How to See into the Future

Speaker: Tim Harford
Chair: Professor Wouter Den Haan

Recorded on 5 February 2015 in Old Theatre, Old Building.

Tim Harford will explain what’s really going on in the large-scale economic world – and what it means for us all in the future.

Wouter Den Haan is Professor of Economics and Co-Director of the Centre for Macroeconomics.

[mcleanblades]

I did consulting work at a hedge fund in the 90s that did daily trading in commodities. Although they managed over 1 billion dollars the staff was just 40 people spread out in NY and CA. Every morning the computer trading algorithms would tell them what to purchase for the day. They had several traders to obfuscate their identity (so their trades would be less likely to impact prices). The Feds called us all the time. And when the markets closed (3PM PST) they would compare expected versus actual. And they'd manipulate that day's results to prepare for trading the next day. There was some drama at the place and one of the founding partners (an OR Phd from Cal) was forced to quit and they moved their operations to NY - out of CA completely.

[brianstine]

the title of this video is "how to see into the future" and he didn't tell us I wish I saw that one comming