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What we didn’t learn about the events of Oct. 15

What we didn’t learn about the events of Oct. 15

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This week, the US.government released its report on the events of October 15.

I was disappointed.

The 72-page report has lots of points of interest but doesn’t come up with any definitive reason for the sharp movements in the 10-year U.S. Treasury. More disappointing than that (for me) was the report’s treatment of the events leading up to the day and specifically its very brief mention of volatility selling.

Here’s what the report said:

In addition, market participants reported that some large asset managers had maintained positions structured to profit from a continuation of the low-volatility environment that characterized much of 2014, though data to validate such claims are limited. Some market participants have speculated that a change in the distribution of certain options-specific risk factors among certain firms could have been a contributing factor. In particular, anecdotal commentary suggested that some dealers had absorbed a portion of the sizable “short volatility” position believed to have been previously maintained by large asset managers. As volatility spiked on October 15, those positions would have prompted some dealers to dynamically hedge this exposure, exacerbating the downward move in yields.

Long-time readers of this blog may remember that this is something I’ve written about before, specifically in a piece for the Financial Times entitled: “Caught on the wrong side of the ‘vol’ trade.” Unlike the Oct. 15 report, that article names a specific player who was said to have suddenly stopped selling vol.

“Pimco was a massive seller of volatility and when Gross left they started taking that position back,” says one hedge fund trader. “The Street was still thinking that short was out there. People expected the road to be there and the road wasn’t there.”

Given the debate over whether large asset managers are or are not systemically-important, it’s shame the Oct. 15 report did not dive into this particular theme a bit more.

Tourists caught on the wrong side of the volatility trade?

Tourists caught on the wrong side of the volatility trade?

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We know that banks and hedge funds a traditional sellers of volatility. But low interest rates and somnambulant markets have also encouraged asset managers (or “tourists” as the banks and hedgies sometimes call them) to take up the strategy as they seek to juice their returns. It seems … risky.

This story has a lot of stuff in it, including a smallish dive into the events of October 15.

Long the domain of professional speculators like big banks and hedge funds, “selling volatility” — as such wagers are known — became one of the most popular trades of the year as a much wider range of investors piled into bets that asset prices would remain stable.

Now, as the prospect of the Federal Reserve raising interest rates draws increasingly near, the concern is that market volatility will return with a bang in 2015 and those investors caught on the wrong side of the revival will suffer badly.

“Volatility is a zero-sum game — for every buyer there is a seller. But what has changed is the type of sellers,” says Maneesh Deshpande at Barclays.

…

Caught on the wrong side of the ‘vol’ trade

October 15. A financial markets whodunnit.

October 15. A financial markets whodunnit.

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On October 15, prices of US government bonds – one of the most liquid markets in the world – whipsawed violently and sparked a wave of speculation on Wall Street as to the culprit(s) behind the wild moves.

Here’s a longish analysis of what happened. The key suspects: lack of liquidity, the rise of electronic trading, a classic gamma trap (possibly sparked by the scuppering of the AbbVie/Shire deal) and much, much more.

… On October 15, the yield on the benchmark 10-year US government bond, which moves inversely to price, plunged 33 basis points to 1.86 per cent before rising to settle at 2.13 per cent. While that may not seem like much, analysts say the move was seven standard deviations away from its intraday norm – meaning it might be expected to occur once every 1.6bn years.

For several minutes, Wall Street stood still as traders watched their screens in disbelief. Electronic pricing machines, which now play a bigger role than ever in the trading of Treasuries, were halted and orders cancelled by nervous dealers as prices see-sawed.

The events have sparked a financial “whodunnit” as investors, traders and regulators seek to understand what happened – and to determine whether October 15 was a unique event or a harbinger of further perilous trading conditions to come.

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Bonds: Anatomy of a market meltdown