HFT is not just a risk of synthetic crashes, it's essentially a tax collected by private companies. I say I want to buy XYZ, you run in front of me and buy the

HFT is not just a risk of synthetic crashes, it's essentially a tax collected by private companies. I say I want to buy XYZ, you run in front of me and buy the last XYZ at that price and kindly offer to sell it to me for just a trifle more. Why thank you for providing me such a fantastic service. I've never seen anyone else in the markets proclaiming how great it is that we have HFT providing liquidity, not like the bad old days 5 years ago or so, when it was so very difficult to push a market order through. It's always the HFT companies themselves insisting how vital they are.