Thank you for your kind comments. I’m glad you enjoy my writings and insights, and I hope you keep coming back — it only gets better. Now. . .

As for your question, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with brokers, traders and invement banking firms making an honest profit. However, from time-to-time here on the Global Markets blog I’ve tried to use my industry “insider” insights to expose some unseemly practices that cost investors, and ultimately confidence in the financial system, lots of capital. That is to say, that there is something wrong when brokers, traders, hedge funds and investment bankers leverage an already HUGE assymetrical advantage in terms of price, timing, availability and methods (so-called “best practices”) game (i.e., cheat!) the system to take advantage of consumers and investors to the tune of billions upon billions in the name of greed and profitability. That, in my humble opinion, is niether fair, nor free trade. What’s happening in the financial system takes the concept of ‘caveat emptor’ to a whole new level! And we are, afterall, a nation of laws; and as investors you have equal protection under the law — whether those laws are broken by individual private citizens, or by corporate citizens — they ought to be held accountable for breaking the rules, cheating, and undermining the capitalist system. It is truly ironic to me that it is Wall Street and the banking system that is responsible for ruining capitalism with their outlandish practices (See my earlier post: How Wall Street Ruined Capitalism) so much so that we are now debating replacing, or at least restructuring how we play the game, to level the playing field. I say make profits — I am afterall, a capitalist too — but do so fairly, responsibly and legally; and perhaps with a mind to how such practices affect human lives and families. That’s all I’m saying. . .

Why is it wrong for traders and investors to make a profit, if the practices themselves are not illegal? Certainly you can’t blame financial innovation, can you? I say let the chips fall where they may if the best and the brightest find ways to create wealth that benefits all of society. Anyway, that’s my two cents. Keep up the good work and I will keep reading.