Warren Buffett today rebutted charges that Business Wire, a Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE:BRK.A) (NYSE:BRK.B) subsidiary, gave special advantage to high frequency traders before Business Wire information was available to general investors. In a February 6 Wall Street Journal article Scott Patterson, author of the algorithmic trading book The Quants, wrote, “High-frequency traders have been paying to get direct access to market-moving news releases, a practice that can give firms the ability to trade fractions of a second ahead of less fleet-footed investors. The traders are getting news releases from Business Wire, which distributes corporate-earnings releases and economic reports such as the Philadelphia Federal Reserve’s…
Warren Buffett Defends Business Wire On HFT Issue
Mark Melin
Mark Melin is an alternative investment practitioner whose specialty is recognizing the impact of beta market environment on a technical trading strategy. A portfolio and industry consultant, wrote or edited three books including High Performance Managed Futures (Wiley 2010) and The Chicago Board of Trade’s Handbook of Futures and Options (McGraw-Hill 2008) and taught a course at Northwestern University's executive education program.