Last week I mentioned a industry roundtable facilitated by the Aite Group, a research think tank that provides actionable, strategic advice on IT, business and regulatory issues in the financial services industry. It’s a group we admire for their finger in the wind forecasts and analysis of emerging trends – special hat tip to Sang Lee (the Obi One) and Brad Bailey (the young Jedi) for providing an example of what we mean.

In early May, Aite Group hosted a roundtable discussion on the practical application of event processing (EP) in the capital markets. Panelists agreed that event processing will experience broader acceptance in the capital markets space in years to come.

What is Event Processing?

In a nutshell it’s making actionable sense from enormous amounts of data in order to make a real-time decision. In our corner of the world I believe it to be an umbrella term that encompasses algorithmic trading – others apply an even broader definition.

How does this affect me?

EP offers a way out from the information overload. From the Aite Group’s findings: “EP is solving challenges in the capital markets where extreme volumes of data are overwhelming traditional technologies.”

Here’s another clue: we are seeing a young guerilla gain weight before our very eyes. Aite Group estimates that “EP revenues will reach approximately US$460 million by 2010 – over four times the estimate for 2007.”

Are you a Trade-Ideas subscriber and Odds Maker customer? If so you’re already getting statistically proven guidance on critical trade managment decisions like, “How long to hold each trade opportunity? When to trade during the market session – skip the open? exit before the close?” Soon you’ll also have the opportunity to automate these rules and let the software make these trades with surgical precision. As Aite Group observes, “EP is allowing firms (like Trade-Ideas) to capture alpha through the analysis of great amounts of data and by focusing in on opportunities that otherwise might have been overlooked.”

Stay tuned.