A Little Human Touch Amoung The Rise Of Market Machines

Sales traders are beating computer algorithms as big clients with huge trade volumes prefer humans over machines, according to Bloomberg.

Sales traders such as Samantha Huggins of Citigroup are in demand "because they are proving more adept than computer programs at trading big chunks of stock, dubbed block trades."

Huggins says her 18 years of experience enables to avoid the drawbacks of letting some software slice the trade into tiny tranches over hours or an entire day.

Bloomberg, citing a data from Greenwich Associates, said in the U.S. sales-trader execution of single stocks rose to about 51 percent -- the first increase since 2011 and in Europe, the number is 55 percent.

Amid cutting tens of thousands of jobs in the last few years alone, U.S. and European banks have been ramping up hiring of high touch sales traders in the last six to eight months, says recruitment firm Armstrong International.

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Bloomberg noted the customized service isn't for everyone. At banks like Citigroup, the biggest clients are the ones pining for the human touch. That's because they're only getting bigger and so hold ever larger positions.

Meanwhile, global concerns such as Brexit have spooked portfolio managers into withdrawing from the market at levels not seen in more than 14 years. An algorithm can't find them, but an astute trader might be able to.

Bloomberg said Deutsche Asset Management, which oversees $842 billion, takes pride in its electronic operation, but says about 65 percent of the firm's trades by value still go through humans.

"There's a place for algos, but it's not the only solution," said Nick Wills, Citigroup's Europe, Middle East and Africa head of equity platform sales. "We're most interested in where this equilibrium goes."