Accidental Deployment
Nathaniel Popper (via Andy Baio):
The Knight Capital Group announced on Thursday that it lost $440 million when it sold all the stocks it accidentally bought Wednesday morning because a computer glitch.
When the time comes to deploy the new market making software, which is likely handled by a different group, the Tester is accidentally included in the release package and started on NYSE’s live system. On the morning of August 1st, the Tester is ready to do its job: test market making software. Except this time it’s no longer in the lab, it’s running on NYSE’s live system. And it’s about to test any market making software running, not just Knights. With real orders and real dollars. And it won’t tell anyone about it, because that’s not its function.
