January 2, 2016
I support the IEX exchange and would like to see its filing approved.
The majority of investors in our markets do not use high frequency trading strategies.
However, when executing retail orders in the equities markets, they are forced have their orders handled by high frequency firms.
During this process, most (if not all) of these retail orders are purchased by high speed trading firms. An enormous amount of money is paid for this order flow.
The reason they do this is because they make substantial profits through internalization by pricing these orders using the much slower SIP and latency arbitrage.
Why is a small group of traders allowed to gain a major advantage over the majority of participants?
I want a choice a choice to execute my orders on an exchange that doesn't believe in taking advantage of my orders. I do not have this choice now because IEX is not an NMS exchange. Approving this application as filed makes the choice available.
I believe the SEC is responsible for protecting and siding with longer term investors - the majority in our markets.
That simply is not happening. Please initiate change. Please approve this application.