Part of the problem I think is that big investment companies and institutions (pension funds and asset managers) rebalance their portfolios in ever shorter inte

Part of the problem I think is that big investment companies and institutions (pension funds and asset managers) rebalance their portfolios in ever shorter intervals. The game has sped up dramatically. This means that big investors reevaluate their portfolio composition ever more frequently and thus companies have a shrinking leeway in sacrificing short term gains for long term prospects. A company whose stock is ouperformed by a competitor purely because of short term tricks runs the risk that their company will be downweighted at the next rebalancing time. This then results in further selling pressure on the stock. It's all a feedback loop really. This is further exacerbated by using the same quantitative models across many investment companies, resulting in herd behavior and clustering. There are other considerations for sure, but I see the above as at least part of the problem.