Free Republic

Newly released State Department emails help reveal how a major Clinton Foundation donor was placed on a sensitive government intelligence advisory board even though he had no obvious experience in the field, a decision that appeared to baffle the department’s professional staff. The emails further reveal how, after inquiries from ABC News, the Clinton staff sought to “protect the name” of the Secretary, “stall” the ABC News reporter and ultimately accept the resignation of the donor just two days later. Copies of dozens of internal emails were provided to ABC News by the conservative political group Citizens United, which obtained...

Everyone's talking about Michael Lewis' latest book Flash Boys and HFT (high-frequency trading) and whether the markets are rigged. What they're not talking about is how the markets have been set up for institutionalized rigging. I'm not kidding. The markets are rigged. You're going to have to get over it and deal with it. The rigging is in the system and that's just the way it is... As to HFT, I'll get to that... But you can't pass judgment on HFT until you understand how cascading technology and unintended consequences landed us in the deep end of the dark pool...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Fears that high-speed traders have been rigging the U.S. stock market went mainstream last week thanks to allegations in a book by financial author Michael Lewis, but there may be a more serious threat to investors: the increasing amount of trading that happens outside of exchanges. Some former regulators and academics say so much trading is now happening away from exchanges that publicly quoted prices for stocks on exchanges may no longer properly reflect where the market is. And this problem could cost investors far more money than any shenanigans related to high frequency trading. When...

It's time for a public hearing about what's going on with our stock market. I've said Michael Lewis' claim that the stock market is "rigged" is a gross exaggeration, but we can thank him for one thing: the megaphone he has with "60 Minutes" has helped revive a sleepy debate on what is right—and wrong—with our market structure. And now, it is time to strike while the iron is hot: It's time for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to convene a series of public hearings on the stock market. Read More Michael Lewis, 'Flash Boys,' and '60 Minutes' Bring...

Above the Restoration Hardware in this Jersey Shore town, not far from the Navesink River, lurks a Wall Street giant. Here, inside the humdrum offices of a tiny trading firm called Tradeworx, workers in their 20s and 30s in jeans and T-shirts quietly tend high-speed computers that typically buy and sell 80 million shares a day. But on the afternoon of May 6, as the stock market began to plunge in the “flash crash,” someone here walked up to one of those computers and typed the command HF STOP: sell everything, and shutdown.Across the country, several of Tradeworx’s counterparts did...