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These high frequency traders typify the harmful Wall St. attitude with which America's twenty-somethings are enamored. It really needs to stop. Let's compare b
by mrshoe 17y ago
These high frequency traders typify the harmful Wall St. attitude with which America's twenty-somethings are enamored. It really needs to stop.
Let's compare business to football.
Some people become experts in training, coaching and playing football. Others manage teams and learn how to spot talent and work with dynamics between players to create winning combinations. They're trying to raise the bar and increase the level of competition within the game.
Then there is a class of people who don't really add anything to the game, but they want to profit off of it. These are the gamblers.
High frequency traders are like meta-meta-football players. They try to profit off transactions between the gamblers.
Frankly, I don't know how they can look at themselves in the mirror. I wish they would put their minds to good use and actually solve real problems instead of meta ones.
- bhousel 17y agoYour gamblers vs. players analogy doesn't really work. The high frequency traders are playing the same game that traditional traders are playing. They just pay for a bit of an advantage in how the game is played. Whether or not this is an unfair advantage is up for debate.
- sam_in_nyc 17y agoYour post is a jumble of invalid ideas that, to me, merely expresses your contempt of modern day Wall St. You're completely entitled to your opinion, but you should be more aware of exactly who it is you are pissed off at. You certainly should not typify anyone on Wall St as "harmful," especially when you do not know exactly what they are doing. The article does not explain what the high frequency traders, specifically, are doing. But it is by no means necessarily evil. All they are doing is two things: they get their trades into the system quickly, and they get current market conditions quickly. If there is anything that you should quarrel about, it is that their system is automated. But, still, at the end of the day they're the ones holding the bag. If they blow up, they're going to pay for it. If they start packaging their complicated and automated trading algorithm as a "bond" and get it AAA rated, and then start selling it to pension funds, then you've got a reason to be pissed.