SEC Proposes Wall Street Transparency Via Python

An anonymous reader writes "A US federal agency is considering the use of computing languages to specify legal requirements. 'We are proposing that the computer program be filed on EDGAR in the form of downloadable source code in Python. ... Under the proposed requirement, the filed source code, when downloaded and run by an investor, must provide the user with the ability to programmatically input the user's own assumptions regarding the future performance and cash flows from the pool assets, including but not limited to assumptions about future interest rates, default rates, prepayment speeds, loss-given-default rates, and any other necessary assumptions.' Does this move make sense? If the proposed rule is enacted, it certainly will bring attention to Python or other permitted languages. Will that be a good thing?" The above quotes were pulled from pages 205 and 210 of the dense, 667-page proposal document (PDF). Market expert and professor of finance Jayanth R. Varma says it's a good idea.

Good idea.

[T-Bucket]

I think a lot of those wall-street types would suddenly admit to everything they've done wrong if you confront them with a big enough Python...

Computational Bureaucracy???

[flajann]

I love Python and I would hate to see it abused this way.

Re:its a step in the right direction

[Monkeedude1212]

Well, Yeah, but to make a dollar, the code is just

Print "$1.00"

Rule 1291.3120-b-Clause 32 Section 1.1

[cosm]

Occam's Razer does not apply to matters of finance. Ever.

Re:Fantastic!

[abigor]

Hmm, personal ads written in Python...now there's an idea.

Re:Fantastic!

[Areyoukiddingme]

Pass your object to her method and see if it executes...?

Trade Secrets

[CoffeeDog]

I can see it already, the financial institutions will all cry "but these magical formulas are what makes us money and if we make them available our competitors will be able to use them too"! And of course they would also scramble to hire some of the winners of the Underhanded C Contest: http://underhanded.xcott.com/ [xcott.com]

Re:Good idea.

[modmans2ndcoming]

Actually... I was thinking no... but only because they are all sexual deviants and have seen those kinds of Pythons in their Orgy Clubs.

No OOP

[Cryacin]

Just remember that one instance of the class of person may never touch another instance of the class of person's privates. You need to use protected for that.

bad idea

[fred911]

The Street has always been full of sharks, now you want to allow snakes?

Cool a new job for me

[nedlohs]

def getPerformance(self, assumptions):
        """Return performance estimates.

        Arguments:
                assumptions: dict, for keys see spec #54
        Returns:
                How much money you will make
        """
        # BUG 91423: was sometimes giving poor results
        # workaround fix is to ignore assumptions.
        return "Millions and millions"

Re:its a step in the right direction

[fm6]

Whitespace and brainfuck are too damn elegant.Give me a properly obfuscated language like Intercal.

http://www.ofb.net/~jlm/intercal.html [ofb.net]

Re:Good Idea

[matrim99]

In this case, one could say "The devil is in the indentation."

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:No OOP

[spazdor]

Well, depending on the language, sometimes you can shortcut access to the other person's privates using 'friend' functions.

Regulators don't know Comp. Languages

[failedlogic]

Keep in mind people don't like computers, programs, math or finance. You have to consider that. So I've gone on Wikipedia and did a search on a computer language that produces *minimal* code.

I briefly glanced only at the first sentence from the following page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brainfuck) and trimmed the first sentence for length: "The brainfuck programming language is ... noted for its extreme minimalism.". See, this is what people want, it keeps things simple.

Re:Good idea.

[TapeCutter]

I think a lot of those wall-street types would suddenly admit to everything they've done wrong if you confront them with a big enough Python...

Considering the amount of snake oil on Wall street, I think the python would be the one begging for mercy.

Re:Good idea.

[TapeCutter]

"My view is that there just is no substitute for a system of social morality like those in eastern cultures of old."

Yeah, Atilla the hun was a real sweetheart.

Re:Computational Bureaucracy???

[ron-l-j]

Please do not teach any lawyers anything about Python. What is left in readability would be destroyed.And they would go on to other languages like Perl, Now that's a lawyers language :D We will have to make a new language for them call black and white. Where any gray terminology is a syntax error.

Re:Good idea.

[Anonymous Coward]

Too boring. You need to discover the joys of leverage and stochastic outcomes. Both make the whole gig far more exciting.

Re:Ugh!

[jc42]

Of course I suppose that to most lawyers, any programming language will look like cuneiform anyway.

This could be viewed as payback for what the legal system did to software by allowing software patents. Such patents are written in legalese, and don't require a "working model", i.e., a runnable implementation in some programming language. So it's impossible for software developers to read the patents and understand whether their own code is a patent violation. We can only determine whether we're violating a patent by "asking the court system", a method that takes years and millions of dollars, and is thus inaccessible to anyone but governments and the largest corporations.

From a software geek's viewpoint, it's fun to think of the reverse system, in which programmers must be hired to determine the actual meaning of a new law, and the programmers do this by writing the tests in a form incomprehensible to lawyers.

I wouldn't bet any money on such a change actually being implemented in our lifetime. Remember that laws are written and voted on by legislators, who are overwhelmingly lawyers. Very few software developers have been elected to any legislative bodies anywhere.