HFT Nothing To Worry About (at Least In Australia)

angry tapir writes "Although software-driven high-frequency trading has got a pretty bad rap (being blamed for the so-called 'Flash Crash' in 2012 for example) Australia's chief financial regulator ASIC says that, in Australia at least, it's not cause for concern. After an in-depth study of HFT in Australian markets, ASIC decided to hold off on previously considered regulatory changes (such as implementing a 'pause' for some small trades)."

Comments

Re:Sometimes I think *de*regulation is the answer

[girlintraining]

If the official rules stated "HFT is totally *un*regulated --- feel free to run your buggies, most insane, glitchy, and flawed HFT software" --- immediately all the other HFT software systems would be coded to watch for crazy non-justified buying&selling.

I love magical thinking like this. It keeps me employed. In other news, "too big to fail." Businesses don't pay for their mistakes: You do. That's the reason for regulation... it's to assure a baseline level of sanity... so when they screwup, they don't do it so badly that they take the rest of us with them.

Re:Screw The Big Traders

[swan5566]

"They amass billions by siphoning it away from the majority of people in the market, and in return give us nothing of social value."

How are they "siphoning" anything away from a majority of people?

How are they giving nothing in social value? The money these people make they spend on other business ventures, familial needs, education, healthcare, charity, do you have any evidence at all that this money is going into a black hole of sorts?

I thought not.

So would the guys a few milliseconds behind - that isn't a relevant point. And that's not even what the parent was referring to about "social value". They mean about giving a sense of "worth" to publicly traded companies, which compels them to make sound business decisions. And the "siphoning" refers to a lack of a "level playing field", which is the reason we have laws against monopolies, price-fixing, etc...