Geeks trump alpha males as algos dominate Wall St

Discussion in 'Wall St. News' started by new$, Dec 3, 2009.

  1. new$

    new$

  2. huh... i guess it's a good thing that I'm writing a thesis on algo trading. :D
     
  3. achilles28

    achilles28

    Yet, the market never changes.
     
  4. On the contrary, the market continually changes. Markets evolve, just like genes. As a grad student. This was an interesting read.
     
  5. Until the alpha male bashes the geeks machine with a baseball bat!
     
  6. "Milliseconds and microseconds?" Perhaps these HFT flyboys should pay a transaction tax. :D
     
  7. kaciara

    kaciara

    ... old stories...
     
  8. Yet all of this continues to create new opportunity for us, the discretionary trader.
     
  9. I'm curious to hear your thoughts (or any others) on how this is so. From my interpretation, HFT is nothing more than legalized front running. If, as the (former?) nasdaq head claimed, the feeds are in the nano seconds, that means you must have a dedicated fiber optics cable right at the originating server to even be a part of the game--
    in addition to having the clout and capital to pay for the privilege to see early information.

    As a discretionary trader at home, all the front running transactions would happen at a pace so quickly, you would never even see the information until it was delayed and mixed in with your current feed. If anything it (adds noise and) takes away opportunity from the discretionary trader, not adds to it.

    Why do you think floor traders are becoming obsolete? And you think your advantages were anywhere near theirs?
    I certainly agree this technology is advantageous for the well capitalized institutional trader desks with 'geeks' as their algorithmic generators, not so much for the 'geeks' at home.
     
  10. That would be my guess.
     
    #10     Dec 8, 2009