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To: BGR who wrote (46683)	6/13/1999 9:02:00 PM
From: Oblomov	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 86076

BGR, I'd agree that predicting the timing of discrete events is impossible in most cases. Identifying a short-term inefficiency in a market may be easier, but one must have sufficient capital and tecnological resources to exploit these inefficiencies. For example, a few months ago I read an article in New Yorker about the founders of the Prediction Company, which uses artifical intelligence and mathematical modeling to send signals to clients such as Chase and Citicorp. Their goal is to have a model that is correct 55% of the time, or slightly better than chance. I'm certain that there are other groups attempting the same thing. But in order to be profitable (even with a 5% mean advantage over chance) one must be able to make numerous "small" bets (small in terms of investable capital, but large in terms of commission, operating costs, and other trading costs). This being infeasible for one with less than, say, $50 million to invest, someone like ahhaha must take fewer, larger bets. And so the impact of the discrete event must be much greater (e.g. financial crisis). The risk of loss would be much greater as well. AA