The New Speed of Money, Reshaping Markets

[BoyRacer]

The New Speed of Money, Reshaping Markets -> nytimes.com/2011/01/02/busin … l?_r=1&hpw

A SUBSTANTIAL part of all stock trading in the United States takes place in a warehouse in a nondescript business park just off the New Jersey Turnpike.
Few humans are present in this vast technological sanctum, known as New York Four. Instead, the building, nearly the size of three football fields, is filled with long avenues of computer servers illuminated by energy-efficient blue phosphorescent light.
Countless metal cages contain racks of computers that perform all kinds of trades for Wall Street banks, hedge funds, brokerage firms and other institutions. And within just one of these cages — a tight space measuring 40 feet by 45 feet and festooned with blue and white wires — is an array of servers that together form the mechanized heart of one of the top four stock exchanges in the United States.

there is more

[johnnyskeleton]

The advantages of this new technological order are clear. Trading costs have plummeted, and anyone can buy stocks from anywhere in seconds with the simple click of a mouse or a tap on a smartphone’s screen.

It still has to go through a broker though, who charges a fee? Is it only a matter of time before anyone can get a licence to trade electronically and all trades will be commission free?

[johnnyskeleton]

Even that requires the brokers to give access to their clients.

I always thought it funny that the great emblem of the free markets - stock exchanges - could only be accessed by a select few.