This is not your father’s stockbroker.
Another Economist article that does a good job of explaining the rise and rise of algorithmic trading in financial markets (especially equity markets) and ends with the following observation:
“For whenever robots are being discussed – even if they are merely the software-based, share-trading variety – the idea that humans will lose their jobs and the robots will take over the world always seems to be lurking in the background.”
Which is too bad…I guess it makes for good copy, ‘sells newspapers’ as they say, but detracts from an otherwise good treatment. Why? It is obvious that people will lose their current jobs – just as sure as farmhands who cut wheat by hand lost theirs with the invention of the combine harvester. But many new more interesting jobs will be created at the same time. This semi-sensationalist treatment of a serious topic – rather than the: who will it impact? how? what are their options? etc. – is a bit of a disappointment.
