The New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ are terminating stop-loss and good-til-canceled orders beginning Feb. 26, 2016. They are claiming risks occur from such orders during volatile trading. They are really admitting that there is a liquidity crisis. Additionally, going after high frequency trading and demanding that they turn over the source code to the proprietary systems will send the smart firms out of the markets. Cancelling these type of orders will only increase the risks for the average investor. The assumption has been that a flash crash takes place, these orders are elected, and then the market recovers. Complaints then materialize with hindsight, as always. Eliminating these types of orders will work in the opposite manner when there is a real decline, for they have the tendency to create a bank of sellers on any bounce and others are carried out bankrupt and unable to get out in a panic. As always, this demonstrates the one-dimensional thinking that screws up everything. This may lead to more jumpers as we saw back during the 1930s.
