Florida Law Review Volume 71 Issue 5 Article 3 November 2020 Regulating the Sale of Stock Exchange Market Data to High- Frequency Traders Jerry W. Markham Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/flr Part of the Securities Law Commons Recommended Citation Jerry W. Markham, Regulating the Sale of Stock Exchange Market Data to High-Frequency Traders, 71 Fla. L. Rev. 1209 (2020). Available at: https://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/flr/vol71/iss5/3 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by UF Law Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Florida Law Review by an authorized editor of UF Law Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Markham: Regulating the Sale of Stock Exchange Market Data to High-Frequen REGULATING THE SALE OF STOCK EXCHANGE MARKET DATA TO HIGH-FREQUENCY TRADERS Jerry W. Markham* Abstract In 2014, author Michael Lewis published a bestselling book titled Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt, in which he argued that “high- frequency traders” have been able to gain an unfair advantage in the stock market, in part because stock exchanges and “dark pools”—alternative venues for trading stocks—have enabled those traders to obtain and trade on market data faster than other investors. A litany of lawsuits followed in short succession, asserting various theories of liability.1 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................. 1210 I. EXCHANGE DATA AS A PROPRIETARY ASSET—SOME HISTORY .............................................................................. 1215 A. Stock Markets Become Data Centers .......................... 1215 B. Exchange Market Data Is Deemed Proprietary .......... 1218 C. Stock Exchange Floor Traders and “Specialists” ..............................................................