Baltimore Digital Commerce Society-- Korhammer on Lava Trading, Nov 6

[Peter Wayner]

This event was originally scheduled for October 2nd, but it is being 
pushed back to November 6th because Lava Trading used to be located 
on the 83rd floor of the WTC. Richard Korhammer's office was only 50 
feet away from where the plane hit. Miraculously all of the company 
survived. Korhammer was across the street with a client during the 
entire event.

But please come to listen to hear about their company not about the 
WTC. They're almost back on-line after having their entire office 
destroyed.  These guys are building a very cool, cross-exchange tool. 
It constantly keeps track of the bids and asks on a number of 
exchanges letting you send your business to where the prices are 
best. It's fascinating to watch the screen update the quotes in real 
time.

This kind of semi-automated, trading assistance is bound to become 
more and more prevalent. I think Lava Trading is doing some of the 
most interesting stuff around.

-Peter



Baltimore Digital Commerce Society

Tuesday October 2, 12:30

Speaker: Richard Korhammer, CEO of Lava Trading (www.lavatrading.com)

Topic: Networks as Markets-- Why Exchanges are Becoming Virtual


Richard Korhammer is the CEO of LavaTrading, one
of the startup companies in New York diving into
cross-market arbitrage. Their network links
together all of the important market makers in
ECNs and keeps track of all bids and offers.
Buyers and sellers using the technology
automatically get pointers to the best price
possible. Traders with large blocks of stock do
substantially better because Lava Trading will
break up their block to match it with the best
price available across all of the markets. This
cross-market arbitrage improves liquidity for the
market and makes it simpler for traders with large
blocks of stock to wade into the marketplace
without leaving a wake.

In his talk, Korhammer will explore how fast
networking and sophisticated servers can
supplement and potentially replace the old
fashioned stock exchange. Traders won't need to
come to one place or one exchange to search for
the best price because the network can constantly
sort through all buyers and sellers. Korhammer
believes that adding intelligence to the network
and the servers supporting is more efficient than
requiring traders to manually manage an otherwise
complicated marketplace.

Will these cross-exchange tools supplant the
exchange? Will they eventually become the
exchange? Will the disintermediation eventually
make all trading a transparent event?






Location:  11 West Mount Vernon Place, Baltimore,
MD

Directions: The Engineering Society lies in the
shadow of Baltimore's Washington monument in the
center of town. From downtown, take Charles St
north to the monument. The Society is to  the left
on Monument Street. From the north, take 83 south
to Maryland Avenue exit. Follow Maryland Avenue
south until Monument Street. The Society is to the
left.

Or look at this map:
http://maps.yahoo.com/py/maps.py?BFCat=&Pyt=Tmap&newFL=Use+Address+Below&add
r=11+Mount+Vernon+Place&csz=Baltimore%2C+MD+21201&country=us&Get%07Map=Get+M
ap


Cost: $14 for a lunch buffet

Questions: pcw at flyzone.com