As someone in the industry, you're also unavoidably biased. This isn't snark or accusation, just a factual observation.

Someone in the industry might just have a slightly better idea of what's really going on and that's largely what HN is about.

Another factual observation is to look at Virtu's recent earnings numbers. They're basically pivoting as hard as they can to get out of speed-based HFT and into execution services, because the profitability of the former is cratering.

Yeah Virtu's market cap is about the same as Groupon. I hardly doubt they're emptying the pockets of every American here.