"Matt, why don't you just send your action over to the 'bean pit' for
chrissake?" The phone line from Chicago crackled. "That's where the
crapshooters are."
"Jerry, I wouldn't know a soybean if I ate one."
"Hell, half of those loonies over there buying and selling 'bean
contracts wouldn't know one either. Come to think of it, I don't know
anybody over on the Merc who's ever even seen a pork belly. Do they
really exist?" He was yelling to make himself heard over the din of the
floor of the Board of Trade. Futures on commodities were being bought
and sold all around him. Just then he paused, followed by a louder
yell. "Right, I'll buy five, at the market. Yeah. I'm talkin' one and
thirteen bid. What? You've got to be kidding. No way." Pause. I could
almost see the blue-jacketed floor traders frantically hand-signaling
each other. Then he yelled again. "Christ, Frank, I'm already long
forty at sixteen. I'm getting murdered here. You guys are killing me. .
. . All right, all right, I'll pay fourteen for ten. Yeah . . . Shit.
Hang on, Matt. I gotta write this down on a ticket. . . . Jesus, I
should be selling Hondas like my brother-in-law down in Quincy. Sits on
his butt all day, screws his bookkeeper at lunch, and the man's making
a bundle." Pause. "Hell, Matt, what'd I just say?"
"If I heard right, you just bought ten thirty-year Treasury contracts
at one oh one and fourteen thirty-seconds. You just agreed to loan the
U.S. government a million dollars, Jerry. Very patriotic. Except you're
probably going to turn around and unload the contracts in the next five
minutes to somebody else."
"Oh, yeah. Right. I should be so lucky. Christ, where's my pencil? This
place is driving me nuts. I think my mind's going. I've gotta shorten
up some here before the close. Hang on."
He yelled at a runner to take his buy slip, then came back to
the phone. "Matt, you're really shaking this place up, you know. Guys
are starting to back away. And the people upstairs are beginning to
wonder. You've gotta think about going off- exchange with some of this.
Hit the market-maker banks. We can't keep up with you here. I could try
to get the Exchange to waive their position limits, but don't hold your
breath."
"No problem, Jerry. My client's got plenty of other accounts. We'll
roll the next thousand contracts through a different one."
"Christ, whoever you're working for must have coconuts the size of King
Kong. You realize you guys're naked here? You're getting short
billions."
"I just handle the orders, Jerry."
"Your numbers scare the piss out of me just looking at them." He
sighed. "Listen, Matt, take care. Get back to you tomorrow at the
opening. Right now I've gotta find some greenhorn to take a few of
these puppies off my hands or I'm gonna get blown out. Jesus, how'd I
let myself get this long at sixteen? Forty fucking contracts. And I was
sure . . . Hey, gotta run. Think I see some idiot over there signaling
a seventeen bid. Kid must be from Mars."
"Good luck."
"Right. Maybe I'll try prayer." He was gone.
I'd known Jerry Brighton since we crossed professional swords once in
the late sixties, and I'd never seen the man actually sit down. He gave
up law early, and these days he elbowed the mob in the Treasury bond
futures pit with the grim determination of a horse addict shoving his
way to the two-dollar window. If the bonds were sluggish, he'd roam the
floor looking for action. Football, you name it. He'd make up bets.
Rumor has it, one slow day he even set up a wager pool taking odds on
which floor trader would be the next to go broke, "tap out" in Exchange
parlance. I'd guess Jerry's own number was pretty low. A reliable
source once told me Jerry'd averaged a million a year for the past
five, even while taking a hit year before last for over two million
when a certain famous "inside trader" sandbagged him with a phony
merger rumor. Maybe it was worth the ulcers. Thing is, I know for a
fact he'd have done it for nothing. A born market maker, right down to
his rubber-soled Reeboks.