[CQ-Contest] 20 Meter Intruder?

[K9MA]

-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: 	Re: [SMC] Weird sigs lower edge of 20m
Date: 	Thu, 31 Jan 2019 10:47:29 -0600
From: 	Zack Widup <w9sz.zack at gmail.com>
To: 	Papadad <k7joe at yahoo.com>, SMC <smc at w9smc.com>


73, Zack W9SZ

On Thu, Jan 31, 2019 at 9:54 AM Papadad via SMC <smc at w9smc.com 
<mailto:smc at w9smc.com>> wrote:
Just a note from the ARRL published item back in June 2018 - See details 
on modulation types permitted with the experimental license:


    Experiments Look to Leverage Low-Latency HF to Shave Microseconds
    off Trade Times

06/20/2018

Experimental operations now under way on HF appear aimed at leveraging 
low-latency HF propagation to shave microseconds from futures market 
trades and gain a competitive edge in a field where millionths of a 
second can mean winning or losing. /Bloomberg/ on June 18 *reported 
<https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-18/hft-traders-dust-off-19th-century-tool-in-search-of-market-edge>*on 
a secretive antenna facility near Maple Park, in Kane County, Illinois, 
and speculated that futures traders might be looking to take advantage 
of lower-latency HF propagation over state-of-the-art microwave links 
and undersea cables, where even the slightest path delay could 
compromise a transaction. The facility is not far from a major futures 
data center. As the Bloomberg article explained, “Rapidly sending data 
from there to other important market centers can help the speediest 
traders profit from price differences for related assets. Those 
money-making opportunities often last only tiny fractions of a second.”

Radio amateur Bob Van Valzah, KE9YQ, said in a May *blog post* 
<https://sniperinmahwah.wordpress.com/2018/05/07/shortwave-trading-part-i-the-west-chicago-tower-mystery/> 
that he recently stumbled onto the first evidence of HF radio futures 
trading at a site in West Chicago, Illinois. There, he spotted HF 
log-period dipole arrays on a pole, and a microwave dish he determined 
was aimed at a Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) data center. Additional 
research led him to the antenna facility in Maple Park, Illinois, which 
also sported a microwave dish that appeared aimed in the direction of 
the CME data center. Two approximately 170-foot towers on the site 
support a directional wire array for HF. Van Valzah is a performance 
engineer on leave from the high-frequency — no pun intended — trading 
field.

/Bloomberg/ said the company behind the Kane County project is New Line 
Networks, LLC, a joint venture of Chicago-based Jump Trading, LLC, and 
New York-based Virtu Financial, Inc. While no FCC Part 5 Experimental 
license appears to have been assigned to New Line Networks, WH2XVO is 
assigned to partner Virtu Financial, which assumed the license from 
Services Development Company LLC.

Sites listed on the license are Aurora and Chicago, Illinois, in 
addition to Homer, Alaska, and Secaucus, New Jersey — home to several 
financial firms and right across the Hudson River from many more in New 
York City. Part 5 Experimental license WI2XAJ has been assigned to 
Toggle Communications, which is using the West Chicago site and appears 
to be experimenting with a similar system from other sites. Other 
entities may also be conducting similar experiments.

The Experimental licensed systems use a variety of frequency 
shift-keying modes, including FSK, AFSK, QPSK, and 8-PSK, on frequencies 
ranging from about 6 MHz to 24 MHz and power levels from 20 kW ERP to 
nearly 50 kW ERP, depending on the Experimental license in question. Van 
Valzah pointed out in his blog post that, while HF is low bandwidth, 
unreliable, and expensive, “you can’t beat it for latency.”

Speculation is that the systems are taking advantage of software-defined 
radio (SDR) techniques and technology. Transmitter equipment information 
on the Experimental license application for WH2XVO was redacted from the 
public filing.

ARRL reached out to the point of contact listed on the WH2XVO 
application but has not heard back. /-- Thanks to /Southgate Amateur 
Radio Ne/ws //for some information/




On Wednesday, January 30, 2019, 6:00:11 PM EST, Papadad <k7joe at yahoo.com 
<mailto:k7joe at yahoo.com>> wrote:


Given the magnitude of the activity and proliferation of such, i would 
suspect there are more than one modulation 'type" that is driving more  
experiments (frequency, mode of modulation) for this use-case.



On Wednesday, January 30, 2019, 5:46:03 PM EST, K9MA 
<k9ma at sdellington.us <mailto:k9ma at sdellington.us>> wrote:


"They are short duration relatively narrow banded signals that sound 
like "time ticks" every 1 second, and hop around usually zero-beat on 5 
khz dial spacing's as observed on USB mode with a 1 khz offset ie 14294, 
304, 309, 319, 324, etc etc."

That's not what this one is, at all.

73,
Scott K9MA

On 1/30/2019 16:38, Papadad via SMC wrote:

A few articles on the high frequency trading by wall street et al: Some 
good posts on QRZ: (one good one by John, W0PV) although some of these 
signals appear to be time ticks versus what was heard today. But worth 
some more query... 
https://forums.qrz.com/index.php?threads/ham-radio-mentioned-prominently-in-high-frequency-trading-story.617581/ 
FCC Part 5 Experimental licenses have been granted to many for HF use 
potentially for this application. Most of those have frequency 
allocations that avoid Part 97 Amateur Radio allocations. Searchable on 
the FCC ELS web site - 
https://apps.fcc.gov/oetcf/els/reports/GenericSearch.cfm At least one of 
the possible candidates not mentioned in this news article, M-WAVE 
NETWORKS LLC, has been granted a FCC Part 5 Experimental license, call 
sign WJ2XGD, that INCLUDES the entire amateur 20 meter band with 4.7 kW 
ERP. FCC Part 5 licenses granted so far WAIVE any station ID 
requirements. So determining the source of the Ham band intrusive 
signal(s) is difficult. Hopefully Hams in the Chicago area continue to 
monitor for these and if possible go mobile and RDF them for ID. The 
Part 5 licenses also include the boilerplate in Special Conditions (2) 
Licensee should be aware that other stations may be licensed on these 
frequencies and if any interference occurs, the licensee of this 
authorization will be subject to immediate shut down." Declaring these 
as QRM is of course a judgement call. But if these signals can be ID'ed, 
IMO perhaps the FCC and the experimenters should at least be notified of 
the potentially problematic situation of using the Ham bands. Of the 
three call signs, only WJ2XGD, M-WAVE, has official FCC GRANTED 
permission to use a Ham Band, 14-14.99 Mhz. And this article is quite 
good as well: 
https://sniperinmahwah.wordpress.com/2018/05/07/shortwave-trading-part-i-the-west-chicago-tower-mystery/comment-page-1/ 
Log the times you're hearing the signals. I suspect that they will match 
various market-open trading windows across US and other market 
locations. Joe K7JOE 
+----------------------------------------------------------------



On 1/30/2019 20:36, Bob Shohet, KQ2M wrote:
> Hi Scott,
> What makes you think that it is related to stock trading?  Can you 
> provide some examples of what the data says?
> 73
> Bob  KQ2M
> *From:* K9MA <mailto:k9ma at sdellington.us>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, January 30, 2019 3:40 PM
> *To:* CQ Contest <mailto:cq-contest at contesting.com>
> *Subject:* [CQ-Contest] 20 Meter Intruder?
> Folks in the midwest US have noticed this very strong signal from 14.000
> to 14.0035. Some kind of data, some thing related to stock trading. The
> bearing is 90 degrees from EN53gb. It would be interesting to get some
> bearings on it from further east. It's definitely not local, as QSB is
> present. Judging from signal strength and time of day 20Z), I'd guess
> east coast of the US.
>
> The bigger question is what is this doing in the 20 meter band? If it
> was authorized by the FCC, have we lost our exclusive right to that band?
>
> It's fading out here at 2040Z.
>
>
> 73,
>
> Scott K9MA
>
> -- 
> Scott  K9MA
>
> k9ma at sdellington.us
>
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-- 
Scott  K9MA

k9ma at sdellington.us