Front running requires that you trade in front of your customers. So end customer calls up his broker, asks for 5000 of XYZ. The broker then quickly goes and buys ahead of him, to get in on the action.
HFT firms don't have customers generally. So they can't front-run even if they wanted to. They'd have to make a deal with someone that does have customers. That's a pretty big conspiracy theory. And it isn't needed because HFT can make money just by seeing what orders hit the exchanges; no need to know about the orders before that.
HFT firms don't have customers generally. So they can't front-run even if they wanted to. They'd have to make a deal with someone that does have customers. That's a pretty big conspiracy theory. And it isn't needed because HFT can make money just by seeing what orders hit the exchanges; no need to know about the orders before that.