Friday Frivolity: Future Citibank Trader Buys 50,000 Lollipops

Citibank has been in the news a couple of times in the past few years because its complex protocols and lack of software safeguards have led to costly mistakes. We had a lot of fun with $900 million of misdirected payments back in 2021. Eventually Citibank got its money back on that one. Last year, as Dylan Sloan reported in Fortune Magazine, Citibank fired a trader who accidentally sold 58 million equity shares when he meant to sell $58 million in shares. As a result of this “fat finger” incident, Citibank dumped $444 billion in shares, causing a bit of market chaos. Citibank had to pay a $79 million fine for that mistake, which also cost it $48 million in losses at the time, and it apparently cost the trader his job. Well, he’s a legend. Rumor has it he is at work on moving markets through manipulation of tariff rates now. Even more impactful!

But move aside, anonymous Citibank trader! Make room for Liam, who is only eight, but is already negotiating highly leveraged transactions in the confectionary industry. As Christine Hauser reports in The New York Times, Liam had intended merely to place 70,000 Dum-Dums in his family’s Amazon shopping cart, awaiting budgetary approval to exercise his option from the higher ups. But little Liam had fat-fingered his way to the purchase of 50,000 lollipops before an ordinary in-house audit performed by his mother disclosed that the family’s checking account was overdrawn. 

Unfortunately, the family comptroller, one Holly LaFavers, is not Citibank. The purchase was made through Amazon, and it could not be unwound. She attempted resale of the goods on the secondary market via Facebook. Her post caught the attention of local news media, percolating up to The Old Gray Lady and then outward to places as unlikely as this Blog. Shamed out of its corporate mantra of “Sorry, nothing we can do,” Amazon offered Ms. Lafavers a refund, and then Ms. LaFebers gave away the candy to well-wishers and local charities, much to the delight of local dentists, whose investments in cavity futures really paid off.

But this is no mere feel-good story. There’s a serious message for you parents out there: password protect your websites, and don’t share your passwords, especially not with little LLF2017.