I Always Feel Like, Somebody's Watching Me

I have no idea whether or not I’m on the “watchlist” but I think it’s hilarious and cool that this is going on:

From Cross Border via FT Alphaville:

Hedge funds are testing out a data feed produced by monitoring a group of financial commentators that includes bloggers.

The trial is still at an early stage, but it shows how seriously the investment community is taking the opinions of those working outside traditional media outlets.

The feed – put together by Alacra, a data aggregator – monitors the output of around 25,000 analysts by combing the web for their comments. This group contains a number of prominent bloggers, such as Barry Ritholtz, Henry Blodget, Felix Salmon and Fred Wilson.

I did issue some words of caution for hedgies that were going to try to trade based on some of the lunacy present in social media a few weeks back.  My point was that with so much effluvium it would be difficult to make heads or tales of the blogosphere.  Here were my examples of what the blog-sentiment reader would be encountering:

Some Typical Finance-Related Social Media Sentiments:

I’m at Ulysses Bar with @DBagMediaGuy

RT @SpeedieTrader Long $FAZ and also Short $FAZ

Since everyone thinks this, I just blogged about how it’s really that.

Here Are The Reasons Why Brazil Is About To Implode

8 Reasons Why Brazil Will Be The Hottest Market This Year

5-minute candles on $ES_F January 110 puts http://chart.ly76387

CNBC sucks so much because (fill in the blank)

“Buy Programs”

Here is my latest 23,000-word Gretchen Morgenstern takedown http://bt.ly64578

I just unlocked the Janitor badge for the W Hotel Union Square!  #foursquare

Goldman Sachs stole my bike

@SpeedieTrader OK, now I’m Short $FAS Puts and Long $FAZ Calls.  I think.

Timmy Boy is showing some real spunk today at Capitol Hill hearing part 146

blah blah Tiger Woods blah blah

Lithuania CDS spreads blown out to a 6 week record high, look out below.

Listening to Carry On My Wayward Son by Kansas on #Grooveshark

@SpeedieTrader took small losses $FAZ, $FAS, Quality of Life, etc.

And then with my customary atomic level of snark, I basically said “put that in your tradebot and see what it spits out.”  I guess they’re going to make a run at it.  I’ll check out the Alacra feed maybe and see what it comes out like. 

Read More:

Blogger Output Helps Hedge Funds to Trade (Cross Border)

A Word of Caution on Blog-Based Algorithms (TRB)