Little slip, big mistake

It’s easily done – a typing error slips through unobserved on your computer as you tap frantically on your keyboard. But such errors can cost thousands, even millions of dollars, if you’re a bond trader. And traders say the risks of expensive and embarrassing mistakes occurring are made even greater by the lack of standardization among electronic trading platforms.

Jim Claire, director of fixed income trading at First Union National Bank, complains of a mishap that will be familiar to many traders: “We had one trader try and buy $100,000 of bonds, and instead he bought $100 million by mistake,” he says.