Edgar Perez, former McKinsey and IBM consultant, is a global expert, author of The Speed Traders, Knightmare on Wall Street, and the course director of The Speed Traders Workshop, “How Banks, Hedge and Mutual Funds and Brokers Battle Markets ‘RIGGED’ by Wall Street’s ‘Flash Boys’, High-frequency Trading, Exchanges and Dark Pools”, in New York City, Washington DC, Boston, Munich, London, Dubai, Brussels, Tokyo, Beijing and Shanghai.

New York, NY, USA (April 28, 2014) — As of 2009, some studies suggested HFT firms accounted for 60-73% of all US equity trading volume, with that number falling to approximately 50% in 2012. High-frequency traders move in and out of short-term positions aiming to capture sometimes just a fraction of a cent in profit on every trade. HFT firms do not employ significant leverage, accumulate positions or hold their portfolios overnight. As a result, HFT has a potential Sharpe ratio (a measure of risk and reward) thousands of times higher than traditional buy-and-hold strategies. High-frequency traders typically compete against other HFTs, rather than long-term investors. HFT firms make up the low margins with incredible high volumes of transactions, frequently numbering in the millions.

HFT may cause new types of serious risks and dangers to the financial system. Algorithmic and HFT were both found to have contributed to volatility in the May 6, 2010 Flash Crash, when high-frequency liquidity providers rapidly withdrew from the market. Several European countries have proposed curtailing or banning HFT due to concerns about volatility. Other complaints against HFT include the argument that some HFT firms scrape profits from investors when index funds rebalance their portfolios. Whether that indeed is the case will be explained by author Edgar Perez at The Speed Traders Workshop, “How Banks, Hedge and Mutual Funds and Brokers Battle Markets ‘RIGGED’ by Wall Street’s ‘Flash Boys’, High-frequency Trading, Exchanges and Dark Pools” (http://www.thespeedtradersworkshop.com).

The Speed Traders Workshop is the first and most comprehensive initiation to the world of high-frequency trading., opens the door to the secretive world of computerized low-latency trading, the most controversial form of investing today; in the name of protecting the algorithms they have spent so much time perfecting, speed traders almost never talk to the press and try to disclose as little as possible about how they operate. Further information about this workshop can be found at http://www.goldennetworking.net.

The Speed Traders Workshop, to be held in New York City, Washington DC, Boston, Munich, London, Dubai, Brussels, Tokyo, Beijing and Shanghai, covers the latest research currently available and reveals how high-frequency trading players are operating in global markets and driving the development of electronic trading at breakneck speeds from the U.S. and Europe to Japan, India, and Brazil. The “flash crash”, the suspended BATS IPO, the botched Facebook IPO, Knight Capital’s trading malfunction and NASDAQ’s Flash Freeze are just a few of the milestones in the history of high-frequency trading that will be dissected with participants.

Knightmare on Wall Street, the fascinating story of Knight Capital put together by course director Edgar Perez, was the most favorably reviewed Kindle edition book on Amazon in 2013, with an average rating of 5 out of five stars. Knight Capital, founded by Kenneth Pasternak and Walter Raquet in 1995, had seen its fortunes change as U.S. regulators made a series of changes in the structure of financial markets and computers were progressively expanding their share of trading. The Flash Crash, the infamous 1,000 point drop of the DJIA on May 6, 2010 (the largest one-day point decline in history), illustrated how market structure problems could almost instantaneously cascade from one market participant to the rest.

Mr. Perez is widely regarded as the preeminent global expert and speaker in the specialized areas of algorithmic and high-frequency trading. He is also author of The Speed Traders, An Insider’s Look at the New High-Frequency Trading Phenomenon That is Transforming the Investing World, published in English, Chinese and Bahasa Indonesia. He contributes to The New York Times, UltraHighFrequencyTrading.com and China’s International Finance News and Sina Finance.

Media Contact:
Julia Petrova
Media Relations Coordinator
Knightmare on Wall Street
+1-414-FORUMS0
info@knightmareonwallstreet.com
http://www.knightmareonwallstreet.com