German Chancellor Angela Merkel\'s cabinet on Wednesday agreed draft laws aimed at putting the brakes on risky high-speed trading, saying it was playing a \"pioneering role\" for the rest of Europe.
Ministers passed a raft of measures to curb the practice of computerised high-frequency trading, which allows trades to be carried out in fractions of seconds and once caused a sudden trillion-dollar loss on US markets.
\"We do not want to ban this or in any way criminalise it but we need to regulate, we need oversight, we need measures to minimise the risks that can arise from this method of trading,\" Ms Merkel\'s spokesman told reporters.
Regulating such trading, which accounts for up to half the trade on German markets, is a \"very important element\" of a wider policy of market regulation, the spokesman, Steffen Seibert, told a regular government news conference.
Ministers passed a raft of measures to curb the practice of computerised high-frequency trading, which allows trades to be carried out in fractions of seconds and once caused a sudden trillion-dollar loss on US markets.
\"We do not want to ban this or in any way criminalise it but we need to regulate, we need oversight, we need measures to minimise the risks that can arise from this method of trading,\" Ms Merkel\'s spokesman told reporters.
Regulating such trading, which accounts for up to half the trade on German markets, is a \"very important element\" of a wider policy of market regulation, the spokesman, Steffen Seibert, told a regular government news conference.