Microseconds Matter: Michael Lewis on High-Frequency Trading

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on November 22, 2013. In early trading the Dow Jones Industrial Average was little changed after closing above 16,000 for the first time ever.

A small group of Wall Street guys have figured out that the U.S. stock market has been rigged for the benefit of insiders and that, post-financial crisis, the markets have become less free and more controlled by the big Wall Street banks. Michael Lewis explains flash trading and looks at the high-tech predator stalking equity markets. His new book Flash Boys shines light into the darkest corners of the financial world and tells the story of people who have somehow preserved a moral sense in an environment where you don’t get paid for that; they have revealed an institutionalized injustice and are willing to go to war to fix it.