ABSTRACT
In spring 2010 the spread betting company City Index launched an advertising campaign targeting London commuters on the Waterloo and City line and encouraging them to ‘Trade whatever, wherever, whenever.’ Next to this tagline, the images to promote City Index’s first application (‘app’) for the iPhone suggest the user will benefit from the flexibility to place bets no matter what else he is doing at the time. In the centre of the picture, shown in Figure 15.1, a handheld iPhone displays a list of market assets and their prices or movement in graphs. In the background are three different scenarios shot from the perspective of an imaginary user: a pair of feet covered by white sand while a whale jumps in the sea; two ski ends and a lift handlebar riding up a slope; and a child wearing a blue helmet lying on the grass with his small bicycle upside down, looking straight at the user betting on his phone. Each background has a short description: ‘1.45 p.m. whale watching’, ‘1.30 p.m. on the slope’, ‘12.30 p.m. bike ride with Henry’. Although the pictures are restricted to times spent outside the office, the message is clear: there are no limits to how, where and when trading in financial markets may be performed. A second message is implicit: trading with real-time prices via an electronic platform is no longer restricted to professional traders working for financial institutions; it is now within the reach of anyone with an internet connection via a computer, tablet or smartphone. City Index advertisement campaign for its iPhone app, March 2010. https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" content-type="black-white" xlink:href="https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780203718872/53f5282e-2cbf-4f7b-abb5-a9e8388ebaae/content/fig15_1_B.jpg"/>
