Warren Buffett Defends Business Wire On HFT Issue

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…