i don't know what all the big deal is about this 'flash crash'. they happen all the time in the futures markets. they are the risk premium for strategies that m

i don't know what all the big deal is about this 'flash crash'. they happen all the time in the futures markets. they are the risk premium for strategies that make a market automatically. this is not a threat to the economy if that's what the concern is. it's only a 'threat' in conjunction with a perceived fear. in this particular case, it had to do with greece. in the 87 crash's case, it had to do with a collapse in the bond markets. all high-frequency trading or program trades do is quicken the whole process. one can implement safeguards to make the whole thing slower -- or you can let the market participants take care of themselves and/or fix the underlying problems and ignore mass hysteria which will reset as soon as the absence of a rational reason for a correction is made clear. i feel like the 1987+ 'crashes' are very different from the 1929 crash, etc. they are not in themselves a problem. so far they've always popped back. which is not to say that our economy has been in good shape since 1987. but that there are deeper issues -- having very little to do with hft.