Remembering 9/11 September 17, 2001: Traders on the floor of the Chicago Board Options Exchange pause to reflect on the lives lost in the September 11 terrorist attacks. Photo courtesy of CBOE Remembering September 11 Remembering September 11 By Will Acworth and Robert Plummer On the tenth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center, it is appropriate for the futures and options industry to remember the lives that were lost and the spirit of cooperation that helped the markets reopen and the firms resume operations. We are observing the anniversary of the attacks by republishing excerpts from the stories we ran in the October/November 2001 issue of Futures Industry and listing the names of the more than six dozen industry professionals who lost their lives on that day. Their full obituaries, posted on our website, tell the incredible professional and personal stories of our friends and colleagues who perished. hen the two planes slammed the attacks, but moved immediately to shut futures industry began the urgent but dif- into the World Trade Center on its exchanges and evacuate office buildings ficult process of reopening its markets. Call- WSept. 11, they struck right at the in the downtown area. Traders and man- ing on expertise gained from the Chicago heart of the futures community. The attacks agers watched the horror in New York un- flood, the collapse of Barings Bank, and destroyed the New York Board of Trade’s fold on their television screens, and sought preparations for the Year 2000 computer physical trading facility and blocked ac- desperately to reach colleagues, friends and date change, the industry moved imme- cess to the New York Mercantile Exchange loved ones in New York. diately to backup facilities and set about building, forcing both markets to close for In Washington, members of the FIA staff restoring connections and reestablishing several days. Among the thousands who gathered in John Damgard’s office as news relationships. Exchanges and firms set aside died when the towers collapsed were many of a plane hitting the World Trade Center traditional rivalries and reached out to the professionals from the futures industry. circulated through the office. Damgard’s most stricken members of the industry with Dozens of firms in the World Trade Center office overlooks the intersection of Penn- offers of help. The government stepped in towers and the surrounding buildings were sylvania Ave. and 20th Street—five blocks with timely relief, cutting through the red active in futures-related business. Thank- from the White House. The staff watched tape to help the industry reopen in a radi- fully many were able to evacuate before the in horror as the news showed a second plane cally different environment. towers collapsed, but their places of busi- striking the other tower. A few minutes later For many managers in the futures in- ness were damaged or destroyed and many a large passenger jet appeared in the Wash- dustry, one of the most difficult things to of their employees were deeply affected by ington sky. The FIA staff watched as the handle about the Sept. 11 attacks was the the tragic events they witnessed. Two firms plane awkwardly banked away from the emotional impact of the disaster. More lives in particular suffered catastrophic loss of White House, headed south and crashed were lost than at Pearl Harbor or D-Day, life—Cantor Fitzgerald and Carr Futures. into the Pentagon. and many survivors were haunted by the Chicago was spared the direct effects of After the initial shock and disbelief, the images of death that they saw that day. 32 Futures Industry | www.futuresindustry.com Remembering September 11 SMW Trading: Day of Terror 13, just two days after the attack. Escaping Just in Time for Cantor Fitzgerald One of the few pieces of positive news One firm that came very close to losing its Although Cantor Fitzgerald was primarily for Cantor amid the tragedy was that many people was SMW Trading, a Chicago-based a bond firm, its subsidiary eSpeed operated members of Cantor’s technology staff typi- FCM that cleared for locals on Nymex and an electronic system for trading fixed in- cally came to work after 9:00 and therefore Remembering missed the first strike. Those employees Nybot. SMW had an office on the 85th come futures and certain energy commodi- floor of One World Trade Center, just a few ties. Many of its employees were drawn became the backbone of the company’s op- floors below the point of impact. Incredibly, from the futures industry and the Nymex. erations in the U.S. and worked with the everyone in the office made it out safely. Cantor occupied several floors at the London office to sustain Cantor’s position Jonathan Markowitz, one of the firm’s very top of One World Trade Center, the as one of the primary inter-dealer brokers September 11 in the Treasury market. partners, normally worked in Chicago, but first tower to be hit and the second to col- on Sept. 11 he happened to be on one of his lapse. None of the 658 people in its office As a result, the company retained much monthly visits to the New York office. In an at the time of the attack—about two-thirds of the operational expertise it needed to interview with Futures Industry, he said the of its total workforce—were able to evacu- regain its footing in a makeshift office in whole building moved sideways when the ate. Frederick Varacchi, eSpeed’s president New Jersey. plane hit then snapped back, sending com- and chief operating officer, was one of the After the disaster, Cantor set up a coun- puters sliding off desks and crashing onto many Cantor employees fatally trapped in seling center at the Pierre hotel in New the floor. the building by the attacks. York. Cantor also set up a relief fund to Unlike other offices on that floor, there Howard Lutnick, Cantor’s top executive, provide financial assistance to the Cantor was no fire, at least not initially visible, and vowed to keep the firm going, but the dev- families who lost loved ones in the tragedy. no loss of power or telephones. Even so, the astating loss forced the company into a fun- 20 or so staff in the office decided to evacu- damental change of strategy. Cantor shut Carr Futures: At the Epicenter ate because of memories of an earlier terror- down most of its voice broking operation, Before the Sept. 11, Carr Futures was one of ist attack in 1993. which once handled roughly a quarter of all the 10 largest FCMs in the U.S. In numeri- Remarkably, there was no panic in the over-the-counter trades in Treasury bonds. cal terms, Carr’s losses were much smaller stairway. After the 1993 bombing, the Instead, the company put all its resources than Cantor’s, but the firm was just as hard building management had installed better into eSpeed, which resumed trading Trea- hit. Sixty-nine of the firm’s employees did lighting and many firms had established suries via its all-electronic platform on Sept. not survive the attacks. clear procedures for ensuring a smooth evacuation. Indeed, one of the positive surprises of that day was how many peo- ple in the towers managed to escape. As People make their way amid debris near the World Trade Center in New York on Sept. 11, 2001. the SMW staff descended from the 85th Photo courtesy of AP/Wide World Photos. floor, they passed several places where burning jet fuel had come down the eleva- tor shafts. Fortunately the way was clear all the way down. “Single file, it took us about an hour and twenty minutes to get out of the building,” Markowitz said. Just as he was about to exit the build- ing, Two World Trade Center collapsed. “I stopped on the 30th floor to talk with the firemen. We got separated by the crowd, so the first part of our group was out of the building when the first tower collapsed. I was still inside with my two staffers and I actually saw the shock wave coming to- wards me, and I had people still in the stair- well behind me.” “A couple of guys in the first group out- ran the shock wave, but two people ducked down into a subway. They were in pretty serious shape because they inhaled a lot of dust,” he recalled. Futures Industry | September 2011 33 Remembering September 11 Didier Varlet, the company’s chief execu- sources to manage this kind of situation, the to use hotels as their temporary offices. tive officer, was on vacation in Spain on the crisis center,” Varlet said. “Our first priority Lehman’s investment bankers, for example, day of the attack. As soon as he heard the was to identify how many people survived took over an entire midtown Sheraton. news, he set about organizing a response. and who was in the office.” Other firms moved into space generously The first step was to separate the operational “Obviously, the first thoughts were for offered by their competitors, and many peo- issues from the human management issues, the people from the office who survived this ple worked at home. In many cases, trad- and set up different teams to handle each tragedy. We made a significant effort to do ers had to be split up and put into different aspect of the disaster. anything we could to help them. But you buildings for several weeks while their firms On the operations side, the firm’s systems also have people in the offices of the bank, looked for a more permanent home.