Who are the people on the stock market trading floor - what are they doing - what are those hand signals?

Question

I see these people yelling at someone up on a balcony somewhere, yelling into a phone, making funny hand signals to someone - there are bunches of people there - I just wonder how the whole thing works! Who are they yelling at - who is on the balcony? Who are they making the hand signals to? What do they mean? What are they trying to do?

Answer 1

They are the Devil's Legions. They are speculating on your misery and try to snap up any joy you might feel on margin calls. They are buying and selling your future and your soul (everybody else's soul, too). But the hand signals are just some mundane commercial sign language.

Answer 2

yell back I do

Answer 3

I had the impression that since most trades are computerized these days, all that shouting and finger-pointing was obsolete.

But I'll check.

Aha! Take a look at this:

http://www.fool.com/Fribble/1996/Fribble...

Confirmed: hand signals no longer used.

The AMEX traces its origins to the outdoor trading in unlisted securities that began on Wall and Hanover streets in the 1840s, the exchange was organized as the New York Curb Agency in 1908; the exchange moved indoors, but continued to use the hand signals developed by outdoor traders. The AMEX adopted its current name in 1953. Constitutional changes in 1976 for the first time permitted qualified issues to be traded on both the AMEX and the NYSE as well as on other exchanges. This Intermarket Trading System (ITS) began in 1978. In 1996, the hand signals used in trading on the AMEX for over 100 years were replaced by a computerized communication system.

http://www.city-data.com/states/New-York...

Answer 4

Make trades

Answer 5

The equities & options floors do not use hand signals, only to give the universal finger salute.

The commodities floors still use had signals, motly in the pits.

The signals are to designate a buy or a sell and the quantity

The people on the floor are members who are acting as floor brokers, market makers, traders or speculators, those in the balconey or on the sidelines are floor clerks who are giving orders or taking reports.  

They yell to let others know that they are changing their bid/ask, or they want to add to their order.

They are not :"trying" to do things, they ARE doing things - buying and selling commodities.

The trading floors, although look chaotic, are very logical each sign/gesture has a particular meaning.  

Trading in such a manner becomes a way of life, many would not give it up at all, and there are always others than would do anything to be part of the floor crowd.

Answer 6

You're actually talking about commodities and futures trading pits.  The New York Stock Exchange does have floor traders, but they don't use hand signals.

The hand signals were developed as a method to communicate amidst the noise of the pit.  Only one commodity trades in a particular pit location, so the hand signals simply indicate whether the trader is a buyer or seller, how much they're looking to trade, and what price they would like to trade at.  

The Eddie Murphy/Dan Akroyd movie "Trading Places" has a scene at the end that actually does a really good job explaining it all.

Answer 7

They are buying, trading, selling for their clients. As for the hand signals, who knows? It's a language only they understand.

Answer 8

theyre traders. thats how they communicate.

Answer 9

They are buying and selling the American Dream. (stocks, bounds, and commodities) For a funny look at the process as it is ongoing, see the movie "Trading Places" with Eddie Murphy.

Although comical and a bit far fetched to the casual viewer, the movies portrays a deadly fact of Wall Street, one minute your up 50 points and the next minute your out on the curb.

These people are buying and selling stocks in the trading pit, the place where all such transactions take place. If you want to buy OJ futures (orange juice) that business is done in the futures pit and so on. The essences of all the action you see is a high paced auction among the many participants. The action is rough but the underlying premises is one of trust and honesty. At the end of the day they settle up and head for the local watering hole to nurse their financial wounds and/or crow about their financial exploits for the day.

And tomorrow, they will be right back in the pits "doing it" to their fellow man all over again.

Answer 10

They are all deaf people.  They are using sign language to say things like "Hey I like your suit!"