A lot already has been written about today being the one year anniversary of the "Flash crash." Most of the articles out there are throwing out a couple numbers and giving a perspective of whether changes made since then are having any sort of effect to prevent another "incident." That's fine, but sometimes it's important to just go back and remember why this was a big deal.
It didn't get the term flash crash for no reason, the entire event happened in a matter of minutes and shook investors to the core. Below is a short audio recording of that period from the S&P 500 futures pits. After listening to this, it's easy to remember why investors and regulators were scrambling in the months following.
As dramatic as this sounds, it's important to remeber that this was a market that worked properly, unlike some equities that traded down to a penny. It's now been a year and regulators have rolled out a number of changes to try and improve investor confidence in the markets. Where do you stand? Have the changes been beneficial or merely a Band-Aid over a much larger problem?
