Opening Day

After some delay, it was finally opening day. No more simulation. The trades would be real. Before the opening, the OBOs compared notes. “What do you have for the opening?” They all had orders to buy and sell ten calls on almost every stock on the floor. (It’s possible the orders were for less than ten lots.) Most of the orders were for the first series that would open. All the orders were from Sutro. They had done the first stock transaction on the PSE Equity floor (Or so we were told.) and desperately wanted to do the first Options trade.

Wally Conrad yelled, “Rowdy opening!” We at least wanted to start loud. He got the first trade, crossing ten Levi calls. Sutro had their historic opening trade. They also had orders all over the floor. They even had a booth and an employee on the floor at that time. He started running around trying to cancel all the other orders. The OBOs raced to fill as many of the orders as they could before the Sutro guy could get to their book and cancel the remaining orders. After that first rotation, the place went quiet. I remember a market maker saying, “They’re off and walking!” Looking back Sutro may have been painting the tape, maybe inadvertently. They really did want that first trade. Painting the tape would become a big issue later.

They gave the everyone on the OBO staff a jar of candy. It was a nice, glass commemorative jar. “PSE Options Opening Day.” We didn’t use it to store candy. It was typical of the Exchange’s attitude. Give the kids a jar of candy.