News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on Putting the Brakes on High Frequency Trading. Parent comment

Re:Putting the Brakes on High Frequency Trading by nickpinkston on Wednesday October 03, 2012 @10:41PM (#4610652)
There are already triggers in place now to stop trading when it gets out of reasonable bounds not right? Say like a x% shift throws an alarm that halts orders until a human looks at the situation, etc. I like the ticking exchanges (like the FTSE does not right?) where it "ticks" on the microsecond or some such so some of the clever hacks (locating near the datacenter) are eliminated.

The real question at stake here is do we want to hold back real algorithmic innovation that we actually want? Of course we need to have alarms to head-off flash crashes, but we want a lot of great people working on getting information into the market as fast as possible right? I mean the end goal as I see it is the replace of most traders to algorithms that bring prices closer to market with better/faster information.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Putting the Brakes on High Frequency Trading by damoncali on Wednesday October 03, 2012 @10:50PM (#4610671)
I would disagree. We do not need innovation. We need stable functioning markets, which is a goal that is in direct conflict with innovative trading. The system, and the participants' confidence in that system is of far greater importance than the efficiency of the system, and infinitely more important than the opportunity for some smart computer guys to make a buck doing essentially nothing of value. "As fast as possible" should not be the goal. "As fast as necessary" should be, and we are well beyond that.
[ Parent | on HN ]