Ayala Pharmaceuticals Inc (ADXS)

[equaloppforall]

That's a good idea, Tin. But the problem is that the brokerages and MMs themselves have hedge fund divisions, so they are not going to charge themselves a fee. If the government is the one that should charge a fee, it would add an additional layer of bureaucratic intrusion, which of course would be subject to further lobbying and neutralization by vested interests. However, I do agree with you that imposing a fee per trade would somewhat curb this current monstrosity.

Also, Hillary Clinton's campaign had included precisely this kind of a fee on HFT firms in her financial policy agenda, although I seriously doubt that she would have actually gone ahead with it. Trump mentioned something about imposing higher taxes on hedge fund managers although nothing about HFT. I doubt that he knows enough about HFT anyway.

The biggest problem is that only 3% of Americans actively manage their portfolios and only a tiny fraction within that percentage understands HFT. So there is no public pressure on the topic that lawmakers have to deal with, and on the contrary, they get paid to ignore its existence. But some big companies and billionaires are also getting hurt (Steven Wynn and Mark Cuban have spoken out) and I hope this ends up in the courts.