Exchange Risk and Reputation

Lightning, it is said, will only strike twice in the same place if it is induced to do so. Strange forces, then, must inhabit the Ohtemachi First Square Building, whose residents have fallen victim to yet another bolt from the blue.

The first visitation in December 2001 was thought at the time simply to be an extreme case of 'fat finger' syndrome, when UBS transposed price and quantity on a sell order for the new Dentsu issue. Despite acting promptly within a couple of minutes to buy back the order after it was clear that it could not be cancelled, the execution desk was still left nursing a loss rumoured to be well in excess of $100 million, just as the ink should have been drying on the team's year-end bonus accrual.

Last