Mar. 12, 2023
Every rule the SEC passes is only as good as the enforcement that backs it. I want to see higher fines that actually serve as a significant deterrent. I think some broker-dealers should lose their licenses instead of receiving fines that amount to nothing more than a cost of doing business - a cost that is often outweighed by the ill-gotten gains obtained through “honest mistakes”. I fully support the rule, please implement it as soon as possible. I deeply appreciate and support any efforts to reduce the speed games that damage the integrity, credibility, and functioning of American markets. I deeply appreciate and support any efforts to reduce inducements and to reduce the ‘farming’ of individuals’ orders for rebate money. A broker routing orders first to a wholesaler, who then passes them to the auction, which might route it back to the wholesaler, seems unnecessarily complex and also grants the wholesaler a profound information advantage against other market participants: they get to see orders well before anyone else. The Commission should address this unfair information advantage by having brokers first route to the auction and specify where the order should go if the auction is unsuccessful. That way the entire market has equal knowledge. The current rule forces dark pools (Alternative Trading Systems) to provide quotes and trades to consolidated market data IF they wish to operate as an auction. I fully support and appreciate rule changes like this that bring more transparency to dark markets. The investing public should have easy access to what is happening within the markets. COMPETITION IS GOOD 15 U.S.C. 78k-1 (“section 11A”) states that "It is in the public interest and appropriate for the protection of investors and the maintenance of fair and orderly markets to assure ... fair competition among brokers and dealers, among exchange markets, and between exchange markets and markets other than exchange markets." For too long the Commission has not be enduring fair competition, especially within the off-exchange systems that currently dominate. It's good to see they are beginning to take their mandate more seriously. Monopolies are bad, and there is clear monopolistic behavior here. The Commission notes that 90% of marketable orders of individual investors in NMS stocks to a small group of six off-exchange dealers, and 66% is captured by just two firms. Those figures will be even higher for specific stocks. The state of American markets is clearly anti-competitive and that needs to change. The current market is obviously not fair and this proposed rule is an important step in that direction. Fair competition is incredibly important and it’s good to see the SEC prioritizing true competition. There are clearly some market participants benefitting from a dominant, anti-competitive position in the marketplace. They pay for order flow or secure it through backroom deals. Why can't orders compete in lit markets? They should - and it's good to see that the Commission finally realizes this. Fragmentation of the markets makes things overcomplicated in a way that only benefits large, dominant players. I prefer a more simple, transparent, and free market structure like the one proposed in this rule. WHOLESALERS ARE BAD