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Billion Dollar Day - Documentary 1986 68 replies

Billion Dollar Day video analysis

Quoting stevexyg
Yes I can see from the still image that it really does look like a line chart but I think what we are seeing is prices on the screen underneath the reflection. They almost do look like fib lines or S/R lines! But you get the best impression from the moving image at 4:40. Look especially at the large rectangular shape to the right of the 'chart' it clearly moves like a reflection coming from behind Richard and seems to be on an uneven plastic surface.

In relation to charts the only thing I can see is behind the trader at 0:07. You see 5 machines....
You may be right Steve. I looked the other parts of the video specially part E when the guy from BBC is talking to Richard after the day ended and we can see that the glass on the enclosure is very reflective and it distorts the bench behind Richard.

Now I'm pretty sure it was not a electronic chart they had.

So I guess the "urban legend" of institutional traders trading only the "tape" is not busted.

I so far I was unable to see anything resembling a chart at Barclay's so they may don't use it.
Yes Richard trades price feed but don't forget there is also a whole world of consultation, news, second guessing, psychology, trading around other players positions and game plan as we will see later in the video!
Quoting stevexyg
Yes Richard trades price feed but don't forget there is also a whole world of consultation, news, second guessing, psychology, trading around other players positions and game plan as we will see later in the video!
I'm almost convinced of that but still not 100%.

When I started this thread I had in my mind that the only guy using charts was Rony Schlapfer. Than the platypus found a chart at William's workstation, so we have 2 institutional traders using charts and only Barclay not using anything.

I don't know, lets see if further somebody can find something everybody missed at Barclay.

Oh! And I'm just posting here at 9:30 AM because I'm pretty much done with my trading day ( us bank holiday)
Ok, I'm done for the day so I went and took a good look at all the Barclay's scenes and I found a lot of "possible" charts, but nothing conclusive even under heavy enhancement.

There are some really wide paper from printers there that I bet are charts but it could be spreadsheets or something else.

The pic below is a example. I found at least 10 times with something that look like the pic below.

Take a look at the paper in the very bottom. It seems to be a chart.

I was unable to spot Richard Hill with anything close to a chart. I'm 99% sure he does not use it. I saw him writing something on a piece of paper and I guess he was taking notes of price levels.

Now I noticed he arrived at the office with a folded piece of paper. It could be a printed chart.
Attached Image (click to enlarge)
Click to Enlarge Name: possible chart.jpeg Size: 214 KB
Don't forget also that not all traders using charts are using line or candlestock charts.

Some other type of charts don't need a live update as we need it to be for candlestick charts.

Example with Kagi and Renko charts. That way it seems much more possible to apparently trade without a chart (a simple piece of paper is enough)
Quoting Akh12851
Don't forget also that not all traders using charts are using line or candlestock charts.

Some other type of charts don't need a live update as we need it to be for candlestick charts.

Example with Kagi and Renko charts. That way it seems much more possible to apparently trade without a chart (a simple piece of paper is enough)
Thats correct Akh.

I'm in the process of interviewing some traders where I live ( bank traders) and I'm waiting for William Wong to get back to me.

I believe by the end of this video analysis I will have enough material to draw some amazing conclusions.

Things that we retail traders isolated at our homes or offices would never be able to figure out by ourselves.
Quoting ForexOracle
Ok, I'm done for the day so I went and took a good look at all the Barclay's scenes and I found a lot of "possible" charts, but nothing conclusive even under heavy enhancement.

There are some really wide paper from printers there that I bet are charts but it could be spreadsheets or something else.

The pic below is a example. I found at least 10 times with something that look like the pic below.

Take a look at the paper in the very bottom. It seems to be a chart.

I was unable to spot Richard Hill with anything close to a chart. I'm 99% sure...
I agree that bottom one could be a chart, there do seem to be chart-like patterns on it.

The other pieces are probably notes of orders filled - like the one we see Richard filling out.
forexoracle, why donīt you just ask "fti" some of your questions. Iīm sure he could help.
Quoting Myo
forexoracle, why donīt you just ask "fti" some of your questions. Iīm sure he could help.
Well, honestly I would like to find everything I can by myself first, before asking anybody questions. I feel like this research process helps my trading IQ.

Second FTI is a broker, Market Maker. I tried to contact them few years when Chris Pavlou was their chairman without success. They floaded my email with advertising but nothing about Richard Hill, so!

I really love to analyse this video, and now that I'm doing it in public with some other fellow traders help it has being a lot more instructive.

I have quite a few interviews booked with some bank traders where I live and some I found over the internet but I'm waiting to the end of this project here so i can formulate the best possible questions and get the most out of it.

Of everything I researched on Forex till now ( books, articles, videos etc) this documentary and the one with Paul Tudor are at the absolute top. Nothing helped me so much as these videos so study and researching anything from it is fascinating, instructive and a lot of FUN !
Quoting ForexOracle

Second FTI is a broker, Market Maker. I tried to contact them few years when Chris Pavlou was their chairman without success. They floaded my email with advertising but nothing about Richard Hill, so!
Are we on the same page here? I mean FF member "fti" from the "Technical Analysis Fallacy"-thread. He used to be a currency dealer in a top tier bank back in the days (70s/80s?).
Traders are mostly trend trader. I saw this video many times and feel that. Wong knows trend and he was watching price and when price bounces from S/R he enter into trade.
One more thing I feel that he had individual currency "GBP" strength in his mind.
Quoting Myo
Are we on the same page here? I mean FF member "fti" from the "Technical Analysis Fallacy"-thread. He used to be a currency dealer in a top tier bank back in the days (70s/80s?).
LOL!! Gosh, I thought you were referring to FTI the company that first posted the documentary on youtube

Sorry about that Myo but I have no idea FF had a member called FTI, what are the odds? Unreal!
Quoting ForexOracle
LOL!! Gosh, I thought you were referring to FTI the company that first posted the documentary on youtube

Sorry about that Myo but I have no idea FF had a member called FTI, what are the odds? Unreal!
lol - indeed!
Quoting Myo
lol - indeed!
Hey Myo, just did a quick research on fti writings and I did not see anything I'm looking for.

As I wrote here in the beginning of the thread after 6 years I could not find a "beyond any doubt" professional trader over the internet. I'm pretty sure they are there but IMHO the internet offers such anonymity that anybody can claim to be whatever they want.

And who will prove the contrary ?

PLEASE I'm not attacking fti! I'm not very familiar with his thread but after a quick read of the first post I kind of agree with him ( apart from the Winston Churchill misquote ) but not to the point of believing him 100%.

There are a lot of members here who claim to be institutional traders. There is the Dibbs guy and even the platypus and others.

Now they may are telling the truth or they can be somebody with a laptop typing from Starbucks and living their fantasy.

Now studding this video I know for truth and fact that these guys are professionals.

What I learned from this video and the Tudor Jones video dwarfs anything I read from allegedly pros over the net.

So as I always say I have to stick with what is working.
I'm still looking for some possible charts on Barclay's trading room. yesterday I posted a possible one now I have another screenshot.

I guess the brightness on their room make it hard to see anything on the papers over the table.

The same lights that fooled me with the reflection on Richards monitor are making things hard to read .

Take a look at the pic below. After heavy enhancement it looks like that we have something like a chart there.

Let me know if somebody sees something different.
Attached Image (click to enlarge)
Click to Enlarge Name: possible chart 2.jpeg Size: 713 KB
Ok, before I go further on part C of the documentary I would like to say something about the whole chart issue among institutional traders.

We are still not there but I can say for a fact that Rony Schlapfer use charts. William Wong definitely use charts and I'm almost sure that Barclay traders use it ( somehow) but so far it is not beyond any doubt if and how.

Now through this whole video there is no evidence that Richard Hill uses it.

We saw him reading news, asking about a news commentary, talking about how bank deals with news etc.

We are not there yet but we will see him writing down the prices from Barclays open positions.

So far I believe we can speculate about his affinity to fundamentals!

Now "to be perfectly honest" as Richard Hill like to say . I'm using the word fundamentals based in a chat i had with a local bank trader around where I live, not based on the video alone.

I live close to Miami and the amount of retired people from New York here is humongous. In a few opportunities I had to talk with retired wall Street and bank people I got some info and the word Fundamentals pops up quite a few times.

Now I'm a pure technical trader. I only look at the news time here on forex factory to be prepared to times of volatility. And to imagine that somebody can trade fundamentally for a few pips like Richard does is beyond me!

So! I don't know lets keep investigating based in facts and see what conclusions will be drawn.
Well we see Richards boss says to him '20 pips is a good profit' and tells him to take it, so lets imagine Richard looks for 2 or 3 trades per day targeting 20pips each time. It's a guess but lets go with that.

So from what we've seen so far, Richard decides on his (20pip target) positions based on a number of things, namely-

Overnight consultation with Barclays trader in Asia - others view
His clients order flow on his books - where the short and long term Barclays account big players are going.
The price (on request) of quotes from other banks via intercom and the change in price on these quotes - a sounding of the market
The frequency of offers from sellers coming in - how many sellers are there
The frequency of buy requests coming in - how many buyers are there
The size of orders to fill coming in - how sure people are of price going their way
News feed
Price action - via live price feed

There no doubt are more considerations than that. But there is enough just there in what we've seen to get a feel for what state the interbank market is in and to take positions with some confidence. If news is good, if the Barclays analyst (who I guess we see at the begining) thinks price will rise, if some clients make a few buys, if a few big buy orders come in from Boris, if price quote requests start piling in (potential for more liquidity), if the sellers dry up (no offers come in), if there are more buyers requesting price, if price starts to rise then....Richard BUYS!!

I'm sure it's pretty obvious when things are hotting up and big orders are being placed so Richards job is probably largely not deciding which direction things are going but more how far they will go. He has order flow on his screen and there is no hiding it. He can see who is buying what and his job I guess is to reason why, think if it's a genuine move and pile in if it's a runner. This is exactly what he does with the Boris buys. We as retail traders can't see most of what Richard sees on his books so we have to rely more on technicals. What do you think FO?

Also FO - how and why does he think Boris are buying elsewhere? What do you think makes him believe that? Does he have an unofficial connection with another bank and are they working together to outfox the Russians?
Quoting stevexyg
Well we see Richards boss says to him '20 pips is a good profit' and tells him to take it, so lets imagine Richard looks for 2 or 3 trades per day targeting 20pips each time. It's a guess but lets go with that.

So from what we've seen so far, Richard decides on his (20pip target) positions based on a number of things, namely-

Overnight consultation with Barclays trader in Asia - others view
His clients order flow on his books - where the short and long term Barclays account big players are going.
The price (on request) of quotes from other...
We are almost there Steve . Me too, I can't wait to get to discuss the agitation at Barclays when the big players are all in the field, but we have to go linearly otherwise we will have to come back and it will become a mess.

I apologize for spending so much time analyzing screenshots, but when all is done I think it will prove to be time well spent
Ofcourse sorry, yes lets not jump ahead. BTW yes the last screen shot could be a chart. it looks like blocks, maybe like a thickly drawn candle chart? Or it could be text printed sideways. But again not 100% definitive!
1:17 min into the video and Richard is texting Barclay Hong Kong.

Richard Hill already stated that " there is no trend at the moment " and that he plans to "play on peoples positions". BBC comments say that he is still planning on "bashing" the pound.

Well, lets see what he is texting.

WOTA COOKING OVER THERE MATE
STG EE

WE WANT TO SELL SOME STG AT 60 WILL YOU PUT --------- IN PLEASE??

WOTS THE AMT

10 PLS

O.K. TRYDEE TRYING

THKS MATE

Again I get amazed on how bank traders were ahead of their time. 1985 and they are texting across the globe. Even some abbreviations look like something from today.

So, basically his strategy to "bash" down the pound is to sell it straight face. They are not trying to push the price up first, no pump and dump strategy here just a simple play in the offer side.

Lets not forget that it is too early in London and he is basically playing the Asian market.

So we have a London Barclay branch trying to make money shorting sterling through a Hong Kong branch.

It gets a little more complicated if you note that he does not specify the counterpart currency. he just say that he wants to sell sterling.

So we can speculate that he would accept , Dollars. Marks, Lira, French Francs, Spanish Peseta or whatever.

Based on this information we see that banks ( at least in this documentary) look a little different than we retail traders do. We trade based on preset pairs while they seem to think more on single currencies.

So if they for some reason see demand for a single currency ( strength ) and supply on others ( weakness) they are more free to hide their actions and maximizing their gains dealing pair free.

Further we will see that The Russians were trying to buy pounds with marks not with Ruble.

So, not only bank traders have more freedom on how to deal their currency but it encourage them to see currencies as merchandise therefore looking more on what is in demand or not.

And following this logic they can accumulate merchandise they think will go up in price to sell later.

It ends up all being pairs anyways but at least for me it open my eyes to think more like they think and try to see what merchandise is in demand or not.
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