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 This comment area is closed to new submissions. Visit ITVS.org to continue the conversation about this film. 12/17/2007 Frank I was amazed to see how fast pit traders who literally grew up on the floor faded into their home offices.But not half as stunned to see how quickly the flow of business went from the trading pits to the screens.I will miss the atmosphere of a truly unique way of making a living... 
4/12/07 Jeff The film reminded me of the adreniline rush I would get standing in the eurodollar pit during a number. So many memories, and a photo of a member I knew that just recently passed away. I found it interesting to read the comments about electronic trading versus open outcry. Electronic trading will replace all open outcry, but I wouldn't put a time limit on it. Open outcry traders know how to survive. They survive by their wits and cunning that no one in the "real world" can imagine. The stress of having your own skin in the game is hard to explain, but the film does a good job of it. I can taste the sweat, smell the odor of the floor. I will miss it terribly when it comes to an end. The CME has done an IPO, and is in a different place than it was. If you ask the former members that got rich on the IPO, they would still tell you that while they appreciate the financial rewards of the new age; they really miss grinding it out and wish they could have another moment down there. I still trade, and love it......
7/12/04 Natural resources have value. They allow those who use them to add value and make profit. The value of natural resources has been estimated to be about $33 trillion per year. If we believe that we all own natural resources equally and that we all have an equal claim to the right to clean air and water, and if we believe that property rights should be respected, then we all should expect to be compensated when polluters put their unwanted materials into our public spaces, our air and water. Pollution causes problems. Pollution imposes costs on society. But polluters don't have to pay a fee in proportion to how much they pollute, so the cost of pollution does not show up, it is not reflected, in the price of goods and services. When prices lie to us about the real costs of what we are doing, we will do the wrong thing. It is inevitable. We should not willingly participate in an economic system that gives us incentive to do the wrong thing. The same basic principles that lead us to respect rights to private property would dictate that polluters pay a fee to the people in compensation for damage done to public resources. If the people say there is too much pollution, that is a sign that polluters should be more strongly discouraged from polluting. The fee should go up. Pollution levels would then go down, to bring the reality into line with what the people want. The money collected from these fees would reflect the value of natural resources. If this money were shared among all people equally, (and why not?), it would be the basis of a guaranteed minimum income. Such an income would flow from a greater respect for property rights, to include a strong respect for public property rights alongside our respect for private property rights. Such an income would greatly reduce problems associated with disparity of wealth. Both disparity of wealth problems and problems of resource depletion and degradation of environmental quality are made much smaller by adoption of an efficient and fair way of taking account of economic externalities: Charge a fee to those who deplete or degrate natural resource wealth and give the money to the people. The basic political aspect of this new political and economic paradigm would include simple questions about what kind of world we would want to live in: "More of this or that kind of pollution, or less?" "More paving, or less?" "Or, have we struck about the right balance in these areas?" The answers to these kinds of questions, when compared to reality, might serve as the best objective measures of how democratic a society really is. If difficult problems can be solved or greatly reduced by taking account of economic externalities, that is a strong hint that externalities are in fact at the root cause of society's major ills. We ought to have some reporting on externalities, per se, and on what are the most efficient and fair ways ot taking proper account of them. Why not?
A Capitalism-Communism Synthesis
Walter Cronkite for President
11/26/02 Mike Curto I would say that traders can be considered both admirable entrepreneurs (in terms of making a market) and at the same time foolish risktakers. For many of the people on the trading floor (I had a chance to hang out in the Currency pits for most of the summer as a runner) the excitement and adrenaline created by taking risks is the reason they come back every day. It is not an easy job by any means. The physical and mental strain easily rival many other tougher jobs. Yet, with discipline, and a little intestinal fortitude, the rewards are far greater than one can imagine.
7/23/02 dabbeljoe optiebeurs@hotmail.com Does anybody know a book about handsignals? Would like to study about it.
3/20/02 Maria cmkennedy001@aol.com I really enjoyed the program. Brought back memories from when I assisted my co-worker in clearing/settling trades for a Mortgage company as he hedged the MSR's with various instruments. The real-time action was instrumental in showing the average individual just how the market ticks and flows in an easily understood manner. This technique is excellent. You can feel the energy from the pit which is great. I thrive on the market and that type of energy. I would have loved to have worked in the pit but I am just to short.
1/31/02 I love the show. I'm actually interested in the field of investing and your show was very educational of the everyday real world events that goes on in the stock market. I wonder if you could actually have episodes on the NYSE, Chicago Mercantile Exchange, S&P and the NASDAQ on how they operate like the episode of OUTCRY:CME. If this has already been done please send me some info on how i can purchase those tapes. If not please consider the ideal of having a show like that. I really appreciate the show. I have really learned more about how stock market operates generally and from this website as well. THANK YOU and GOD bless.
1/24/02 Kyle J Vesperman vespermk@uwplatt.edu I watched the program last night and it was the most interesting and informative program I have ever seen on PBS. I've always been interested in the exchange and for the longest time wondered what it was like down on the floor. My hat goes off to all those involved in the making of Open Outcry.
1/21/02 William Rothstein William.Rothstein@morganstanley.com What a great program. I have dreamed for nearly four years to trade in the pits of Chicago, I now know where to start. As I watched, I felt the cutting-edge, raw spirit that previals. My eyes never left the television screen. Jon Else film took a relatively kaotic looking enviroment and added uniformity and function, while at the same time keeping the mystic and excitement that is the futures market. I particularty enjoyed how he added a person touch, by spotlighting individual traders. I can not wait to watch the documentary again.
1/04/02 c. o. wonderful show. the real-time style is definitely the only way to shoot action in the pits. I couldn't imagine the show any other way. I'm a fulltime screen trader (index options). and, although I've never traded in pits, it's like two completely different worlds. one cannot trade "size" as fast and effortlessly as in a pit. it would be disaster trying that online. I hope people who don't know a lick about trading can enjoy the show as much. I'm going to have my wife sit through it and hope she gets a feel and appreciation for it.
1/03/02 Jeff I saw a bulletin on the Merc Floor today announcing the broadcast of the film in the Chicago area. Only yesterday did I speak to someone who had already seen the film. I was talking to her from the floor of the Eurodollar Pit. Her comment was about the level of stress we all work under. Its stressful yes, but don't foget about about firemen, cops, soldiers (been one), fighterpilots, docs and paramedics, teachers, who endure stressful work environments. To answer one of your questions: are futures traders admirable entrepreneurs or risktakers...My answer is BOTH. It is a mathematical fact in futures that for every winner there is a loser. I have seen guys come and go. It takes a certain spirit to work here.
1/03/02 Henry deGroh For seventeen years I traded for myself in various pits on the floor. I can think of nowhere I would have rather worked. On the floor, your word is your bond. If it was not you would soon be playing with yourself. Never a gambler, the niche I picked for myself was that of a spreader, never a big winner but rarely a loser. Trading at the CME allowed me an early, comfortable retirement to spend raising my children. Wouldn't have missed it for the world.
12/04/01 BRUCE REDDING I'M ONE OF THE PEOPLE IN THE SHOW AND I THOUGHT IT PORTRAYED THE FEELING FOR WHAT WE DO EVERYDAY. JON ELSE DID A FABULOUS JOB AND COMPUTERS ARE STILL THE SECONDARY WAY TO TRADE,JUST ASK THE PUBLIC.
11/06/01 i'm 20 and used to work as a clerk at the chicago board options exchange. one thing not shown in the film was the fact that about 70% of the time nothing is going on. Guys kill time by harassing each other. Sometimes the verbal abuse is so great that in any other occupation it would be considered a crime. One other thing that surprised me when i worked there was how little traders knew about the stocks they were trading--to them they're just symbols. What's important to them is that there be volatility in the price.
10/30/01 William Crook Thank you for doing a documentary about such a fascinating, important, and little understood topic that most 'alternative' filmmakers would have shunned. This film was a risk-- like the traders on the floor live by-- and as a PBS viewer interested in knowing more about how the economy works and in understanding markets and the timeless process of human economic exchange, I really appreciate this effort. |
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