[patrickk]

Yeah Wall Street's been using sneaky 'algos' for a few years now. They are quite lucrative apparently.

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_16/b3929113_...

To answer to person posting the topic, I've seen web design (not programming) in a large, well-established (non-investment) bank. It was laughable. To use the term in this context is an insult to the profession. Those with IT skills certainly weren't given any special status.

Another guy on my team was able to demonstrate that by the bank's IT unit embedding Google JavaScript into the bank's homepage, he could exploit this into showing a competitors homepage over the original one. Absolute joke. He got torn a new asshole for not going through "the proper channels."

[megamark16]

A friend of mine just got fired from his bank job for not going through the right channels. He created an iPhone app, but didn't release it, just asked permission to release it. It' a bit more involved, because you might assume that there were security concerns or technology concerns and that had something to do with his firing, but there were none, the security team signed off on it, but because he didn't go through the right channels he hurt someone's pride and got canned.