Scanning Stocks with Breaking News? A Broken Idea

Scanning Stocks with Breaking News? A Broken Idea

Mar 30, 2010

The world has changed for those trading on news and even stock scanning services that incorporate breaking news into their offerings. News just broke.

The recent injunction by a judge against news headline distributor, flyonthewall.com, ordered it to delay disseminating the stock recommendations of financial services firms long enough so that the firms can alert their clients first.

Flyonthewall.com argued they publish recommendations only after they become “public” and free for the taking because they emerge through other media, chat rooms, “blast IMs” or other sources. This argument was rejected by the court: just because others do it doesn’t excuse the rights the authors and owners of the original research have to inform their clients first.
The order reveals what most veteran traders know – a key to their longevity:

News will always chase the tape.
News is just one way to filter market activity and direct a trader to where interesting activity occurs the same way a foghorn is one way to get the teacher’s attention in a classroom. Stock scanning tools like Trade-Ideas PRO offer a more refined way to get you in front of news (one example). Squawk boxes and services come close but don’t offer the customization of modeling a trader’s particular stock pattern like Trade Ideas.
Let’s face it : News was old even when it was redistributed in real-time. Now by court order you’ll be waiting 30 minutes – 2 hours.
And Trade Ideas delivers a head start by turning statistically relevant analysis of the market’s activity into a game of whack-a-mole: only showing a trader what’s unusual right now and scanning for stocks impossible to find and track on one’s own – or via the news.