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Comment by javert | Hacker News Reader

I would be really interested to know the author's motivation for leaving HFT. For example, did you feel that you could make more money elsewhere?

Eventually I’ll even put forward a policy prescription which I believe could cause HFT to focus primarily on socially valuable activities

I'm really against the government making rules ot try to force people to serve society in some fashion. That's totally contrary to the principles of individual rights and pursuit of happiness upon which the country was founded.

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I would be really interested to know the author's motivation for leaving HFT.

I left to do a startup. I am hoping to make considerably more money than I would have in HFT.

I'm really against the government making rules ot try to force people to serve society in some fashion.

I'd suggest you should stay tuned to the next post, since you will likely not object to my proposal. It's not a punitive measure designed to express disapproval, it's a minor tweak to market mechanics.

I'd suggest you should stay tuned to the next post

Definitely looking forward to it.

It is interesting that you believe that E(compensation in a start up) > E(compensation running a HFT strategy). The popular media is awash with reports of billions of dollars being made by HFT traders. Are they completely off?

What about HFTs that are running market taking strategies?

E(compensation in a start up) > E(compensation running a HFT strategy)

I also would like to hear more about this calculation. More the right side than the left, since I know far less about the right side than the left. But I imagine this might be getting into the author's personal details quite a bit.

Well, that is what ends up in the news: guys making billions. What articles are you referring to?

There are also plenty of people making not so much money in HFT and plenty of people losing money. This is a competitive market and it has become more so.

It's a myth that the financial industry pays amazingly high salaries. The maximum programmer salary at a bank is probably bigger than the maximum programmer salary anywhere else, but the average salary is about the same. I worked on electronic trading systems at BofA, but Amazon and Google both offered me more money to work for them. (Some people get good bonuses, but the best way to guarantee that is to threaten to leave for somewhere that will give you XX bonus on paper. I did that but realized I actually wanted to leave :)

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