© 1999 Waters Information Services, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission. This is a reprint originally appearing in the November 27, 1995 issue of Trading Systems Technology. For subscription information call 607-770-9242.

Morgan Stanley & Co. is considering rolling out Tech Hackers Inc.'s Streetmath Bond Calculator in support of 100 of its fixed-income traders in New York City. The firm has already agreed to deploy 50 positions of the application for its so-called private client group (PCG) in San Francisco. TechHackers developed the Unix-based Streetmath system at the request of Morgan to replace desktop Monroe Bond Calculators provided by Monroe Systems for Business Inc. Ultimately, the TechHackers' system could replace a total of 200 Monroe calculators at the firm – a move that would impact about 100 traders on New York's bond desk and 100 in San Francisco's PCG.

Morgan officials decline to comment. But according to a source close to the deal, the fixed-income group in New York is still evaluating the new system. The source says that the TechHackers bond calculators would be deployed in the context of the firm's move to a new trading facility, a project that is already under way and scheduled for completion in January of 1996.

Morgan's PCG in San Francisco originally approached TechHackers to build a software version of the Monroe Bond Calculator. Morgan's New York-based fixed-income group opted to be involved in the development of the Streetmath bond calculator after learning of San Francisco's involvement. Morgan's PCG will purchase 50 floating licenses to Streetmath, which the option to purchase 50 more, allowing any trader on the floor to retrieve a copy of the electronic calculator off a server. Streetmath costs about $795 for one license, about half the price of one Monroe Bond Calculator.

The Streetmath calculator will run on Sun Microsystems Inc., Unix-based Sparcstations at Morgan. Morgan has had a firmwide devotion to Sun's Sparcstations for many years (TST, Oct. 19, 1992). TechHackers plans to release a Microsoft Corp. Windows NT version of its product in the near future, vendor officials say.

Streetmath allows users to interact with data from their bond portfolios and other databases in a graphical user interface environment.
Streetmath has three screens, for bonds, bills or CDs. Bond types covered are Treasury, corporate, agency, municipal, international, callable, steps and sinking funds. Analytics include price, yield, duration, convexity, average life, price value of a basis point, coupon amount, invoice calculations, accrued interest and dirty price. Price can be featured in 32nds, 16ths, eighths or decimals.

Morgan has been steadily equipping its new trading floor over the past few months. In addition to a range of proprietary applications, including homegrown digital data distribution systems, Morgan has selected a video-switching system from Securities Dealing Systems Inc./Troy Systems Ltd. to support 100 fixed-income traders (TST, July 10) and some 1,500 trading turrets and other telephone systems from IPC Information Systems Inc. (TST, Aug. 7). The firm also holds a global license to Leading Market Technologies Inc.'s Expo graphical toolset (TST, Nov. 15, 1993), as well as to Triteal Inc.'s Unix GUI product and Lucid Inc.'s Unix-based application development tools (TST, June 27, 1994).

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