When machines control your world

[napman]

Imagine all the people were control by these machines (and yes we are heading that direction now

Even after the reports of human error popped up in the afternoon, the Dow still closed down more than 3 percent for the day. Greece remains a fiscal basket case, as well as a warning sign. Market insiders are worried that Spain is next, and that is what really has everyone on Wall Street spooked.


That?s what happens when machines control your world, and when your fate rests on whether some trader, under second-to-second pressure, clumsily types the wrong thing into those machines.

But that isn?t why yesterday?s stock charts resembled a 400-pound man going into fatal cardiac arrest. No, that responsibility falls on the fat finger, or more likely, a series of fat fingers, including one trader?believed to be from Citigroup?who apparently tried to sell $15 billion worth of stock futures, rather than $15 million. This thousand-fold mistake instantly devastated the value of American business jewels like 3M and Procter and Gamble, and took consulting firm Accenture from $40 a share to one penny in a matter of minutes, dragging the major indices down in lockstep.

Panic ensued. And make no mistake, this was real thing: heaving, shaking, palpitations. One Wall Street heavyweight who sits in the middle of a few billion dollars in daily market activity told me that he left for a late lunch, pre-fat finger, only to return to a surprising sight on his trading floor: ?Everyone was white as a ghost.?

That?s what happens when machines control your world, and when your fate rests on whether some trader, under second-to-second pressure, clumsily types the wrong thing into those machines.

GOD HELP US ALL

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