IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ecb/ecbwps/20172020.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

High frequency trading and fragility

Author

Listed:
  • Cespa, Giovanni
  • Vives, Xavier

Abstract

We show that limited dealer participation in the market, coupled with an informational friction resulting from high frequency trading, can induce demand for liquidity to be upward sloping and strategic complementarities in traders' liquidity consumption decisions: traders demand more liquidity when the market becomes less liquid, which in turn makes the market more illiquid, fostering the initial demand hike. This can generate market instability, where an initial dearth of liquidity degenerates into a liquidity rout (as in a flash crash). While in a transparent market, liquidity is increasing in the proportion of high frequency traders, in an opaque market strategic complementarities can make liquidity U-shaped in this proportion as well as in the degree of transparency. JEL Classification: G10, G12, G14

Suggested Citation

  • Cespa, Giovanni & Vives, Xavier, 2017. "High frequency trading and fragility," Working Paper Series 2020, European Central Bank.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecb:ecbwps:20172020
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ecb.europa.eu//pub/pdf/scpwps/ecbwp2020.en.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. YiLi Chien & Harold Cole & Hanno Lustig, 2012. "Is the Volatility of the Market Price of Risk Due to Intermittent Portfolio Rebalancing?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(6), pages 2859-2896, October.
    2. Giovanni Cespa & Xavier Vives, 2015. "The Beauty Contest and Short-Term Trading," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(5), pages 2099-2154, October.
    3. Giovanni Cespa & Thierry Foucault, 2014. "Illiquidity Contagion and Liquidity Crashes," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(6), pages 1615-1660.
    4. Biais, Bruno & Foucault, Thierry & Moinas, Sophie, 2015. "Equilibrium fast trading," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(2), pages 292-313.
    5. Bruno Biais & Fany Declerck & Sophie Moinas, 2016. "Who supplies liquidity, how and when?," BIS Working Papers 563, Bank for International Settlements.
    6. Giovanni Cespa & Xavier Vives, 2012. "Dynamic Trading and Asset Prices: Keynes vs. Hayek," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 79(2), pages 539-580.
    7. Glosten, Lawrence R. & Milgrom, Paul R., 1985. "Bid, ask and transaction prices in a specialist market with heterogeneously informed traders," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 71-100, March.
    8. Albert J. Menkveld & Marius A. Zoican, 2017. "Need for Speed? Exchange Latency and Liquidity," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 30(4), pages 1188-1228.
    9. Songzi Du & Haoxiang Zhu, 2014. "Welfare and Optimal Trading Frequency in Dynamic Double Auctions," NBER Working Papers 20588, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Steven L. Heston & Robert A. Korajczyk & Ronnie Sadka, 2010. "Intraday Patterns in the Cross‐section of Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 65(4), pages 1369-1407, August.
    11. Pierre Collin-Dufresne & Vyacheslav Fos, 2015. "Do Prices Reveal the Presence of Informed Trading?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(4), pages 1555-1582, August.
    12. Spiegel, Matthew, 1998. "Stock Price Volatility in a Multiple Security Overlapping Generations Model," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 11(2), pages 419-447.
    13. Stefan Nagel, 2012. "Evaporating Liquidity," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 25(7), pages 2005-2039.
    14. Dimitri Vayanos & Jiang Wang, 2012. "Liquidity and Asset Returns Under Asymmetric Information and Imperfect Competition," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 25(5), pages 1339-1365.
    15. Albert J. Menkveld, 2016. "The Economics of High-Frequency Trading: Taking Stock," Annual Review of Financial Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 8(1), pages 1-24, October.
    16. Jennifer Huang & Jiang Wang, 2009. "Liquidity and Market Crashes," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(7), pages 2407-2443, July.
    17. Darrell Duffie, 2010. "Presidential Address: Asset Price Dynamics with Slow‐Moving Capital," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 65(4), pages 1237-1267, August.
    18. Itay Goldstein & Liyan Yang, 2015. "Information Diversity and Complementarities in Trading and Information Acquisition," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(4), pages 1723-1765, August.
    19. Michael Goldstein & Shengwei Ding & John Hanna & Terrence Hendershott, 2014. "How Slow Is the NBBO? A Comparison with Direct Exchange Feeds," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 49(2), pages 313-332, May.
    20. Eric Budish & Peter Cramton & John Shim, 2015. "Editor's Choice The High-Frequency Trading Arms Race: Frequent Batch Auctions as a Market Design Response," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 130(4), pages 1547-1621.
    21. Jonathan Brogaard & Terrence Hendershott & Ryan Riordan, 2014. "High-Frequency Trading and Price Discovery," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(8), pages 2267-2306.
    22. Breckenfelder, Johannes, 2013. "Competition between high-frequency traders, and market quality," MPRA Paper 66715, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Dec 2013.
    23. David Easley & Marcos M. López de Prado & Maureen O'Hara, 2012. "Flow Toxicity and Liquidity in a High-frequency World," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 25(5), pages 1457-1493.
    24. Itay Goldstein & Yan Li & Liyan Yang, 2014. "Speculation and Hedging in Segmented Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(3), pages 881-922.
    25. Hoffmann, Peter, 2014. "A dynamic limit order market with fast and slow traders," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(1), pages 156-169.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Vives, Xavier & Cespa, Giovanni, 2016. "Market Transparency and Fragility," CEPR Discussion Papers 11732, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Giovanni Cespa & Xavier Vives, 2022. "Exchange Competition, Entry, and Welfare," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 35(5), pages 2570-2624.
    3. Breedon, Francis & Chen, Louisa & Ranaldo, Angelo & Vause, Nicholas, 2023. "Judgment day: Algorithmic trading around the Swiss franc cap removal," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    4. Shiyang Huang & Bart Zhou Yueshen, 2021. "Speed Acquisition," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(6), pages 3492-3518, June.
    5. Sánchez Serrano Antonio, 2020. "High-Frequency Trading and Systemic Risk: A Structured Review of Findings and Policies," Review of Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 71(3), pages 169-195, December.
    6. Zhou, Hao & Kalev, Petko S., 2019. "Algorithmic and high frequency trading in Asia-Pacific, now and the future," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 186-207.
    7. Bellia, Mario & Pelizzon, Loriana & Subrahmanyam, Marti & Uno, Jun & Yuferova, Darya, 2017. "Coming early to the party," SAFE Working Paper Series 182, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE.
      • Mario Bellia & Loriana Pelizzon & Marti G. Subrahmanyam & Jun Uno & Darya Yuferova, 2020. "Coming early to the party," Working Papers 2020:11, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    8. Pavan, Alessandro & Vives, Xavier, 2015. "Information, Coordination, and Market Frictions: An Introduction," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 158(PB), pages 407-426.
    9. Thierry Foucault & Roman Kozhan & Wing Wah Tham, 2017. "Toxic Arbitrage," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 30(4), pages 1053-1094.
    10. Conrad, Jennifer & Wahal, Sunil, 2020. "The term structure of liquidity provision," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(1), pages 239-259.
    11. Eric M. Aldrich & Daniel Friedman, 2023. "Order Protection Through Delayed Messaging," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(2), pages 774-790, February.
    12. Jean-Edouard Colliard, 2017. "Catching Falling Knives: Speculating on Liquidity Shocks," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(8), pages 2573-2591, August.
    13. Sida Li & Xin Wang & Mao Ye, 2019. "Who Provides Liquidity, and When?," NBER Working Papers 25972, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Nicholas Hirschey, 2021. "Do High-Frequency Traders Anticipate Buying and Selling Pressure?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(6), pages 3321-3345, June.
    15. Rzayev, Khaladdin & Ibikunle, Gbenga & Steffen, Tom, 2023. "The market quality implications of speed in cross-platform trading: evidence from Frankfurt-London microwave," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 119989, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    16. Rzayev, Khaladdin & Ibikunle, Gbenga & Steffen, Tom, 2023. "The market quality implications of speed in cross-platform trading: Evidence from Frankfurt-London microwave," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    17. Park, Seongkyu Gilbert & Ryu, Doojin, 2019. "Speed and trading behavior in an order-driven market," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 145-164.
    18. Haas, Marlene & Khapko, Mariana & Zoican, Marius, 2021. "Speed and learning in high-frequency auctions," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    19. Breckenfelder, Johannes, 2024. "Competition among high-frequency traders and market quality," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 166(C).
    20. Brolley, Michael & Cimon, David A., 2020. "Order-Flow Segmentation, Liquidity, and Price Discovery: The Role of Latency Delays," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 55(8), pages 2555-2587, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    asymmetric information; flash crash; high frequency trading; market fragmentation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G10 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ecb:ecbwps:20172020. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Official Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/emieude.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.