Here's a subject never far from our thoughts
Andrew Tyrie, head of the UK Treasury Committee, which keeps its beady Parliamentary eye on all aspects of UK financials, has asked the FCA to look into UK data leaks. In a letter to FCA head, Andrew Bailey yesterday, Tyrie asked that;
"The Financial Conduct Authority will want to consider this matter, if it is not already doing so, given one of its objectives is to protect and enhance the integrity of the UK financial system,"
Earlier this week Reuters reported some analysis that they had run on various data points and found that the cable moved ahead of the data when the actual releases were wide of expectations. They noted the Feb 17th Retails sales numbers had seen cable fall 20 pips around 15 seconds before the release.
The WSJ also ran some analysis and found that over 207 releases, UK bond futures moved in the right direction 59.5% of the time. That's hardly conclusive on a 50/50 bet on direction.
There has always been a great deal of scrutiny around UK data points and we often see moves in and around them. It's not often we see anything really big, which would more definitively indicate advanced knowledge. If you take last night's FOMC for example, we were flipping around in 20 pip clips into the release as traders naturally position themselves at the last minute. The same effect happens in most data points and the UK is no different. However, if there's conclusive proof that the moves line up with the actual release, i.e selling before a bad number or buying before a good number, then the leak calls will hold far more water.
For a further example of PA around UK data points, have a tick or 1m chart open into the final minutes before the BOE announcement today and watch the jockeying I've mentioned above.
