Sounds like you have a problem with Dateks empowering the little guy.
LOL. Again, where did I mention any specific ECN or brokerage firm? I agree with the proposal, and support the notion, that whether an ECN charges $.000001 or $.10 per share, that such fee should be reflected in the quote. It's as simple as that.
As for empowerment, don't waste your breath - I'm the wrong guy to preach to. ECNs are the best thing to happen to retail and institutional trading since the concept and function of sales trading was solidified. Anyone who has been a professional trader, as I have, knows that retail trading interest - particularly when focused through a transparent limit order book such as an ECN provides - is the gasoline of the market, facilitating large orders and providing for continuity where, before them, there was between little and none.
As for abolishing payment for order flow, hey - make the firms disclose their practices in both quantitative and qualitative terms, and let the customers decide. Punish those that don't adhere to best execution standards. But I wouldn't force anyone into direct access trading any quicker than I'd force them to trade via brokers that utilize internalization practices.
By the way, you may have your ideologies crossed. ECNs are overwhelmingly opposed to the "national limit order book" you mention.
With regard to the original proposal - which indicated that all market participants would all be required to meet order entry, functionality and technological standards within the framework of the SuperMontage - IMHO the ECNs are absolutely right to be disgusted by, and fight, a proposed Soviet-style Ubermarket which is anticompetitive in that it is owned and run by their very regulator, and which could conceivably act as both the gatekeeper and keymaster with regard to the types of value-added features and ingenuity could be integrated.
Now, rjm2, if by "national limit order book" you're referring to the transparency-geared proposals that would provide only for the display of market participants quotes, leaving the varying participants to compete amongst themselves in terms of functionality and price, well, most have accepted that plan.
I concur: let incoming orders be routed to the top of the aggregate book at a given time, whether it's a dealer, an ECN, an ATS, or a UTP participant, but let each exist separately - kind of a modern take on the ITS (Intermarket Trading System) which came about via the SEC's National Market System initiatives in 1975. And, as I originally mentioned, the plan should provide for incorporating access fees above and beyond the price level into the quote.
LPS5 |
