In a curious departure from convention, the Goldman-backed, HFT-evading pseudo dark pool IEX, made famous in Michael Lewis' blockbuster "Flash Boys" has decided to post daily volume stats of [3]its operations. And whether it is due to the advertising by the iconic bookwriter, or because increasingly more brokers are switching over to IEX, it appears that new trading venue is gaining traction: according to its own reporting, on April 15, IEX recorded its highest volume day yet, recording nearly 38 million single-counted trades.
Granted the data is only available for April, but what is clear is that unlike most other trading venues which are having significant problems with boosting their volumes, for IEX, at least early on, this is not an issue.
Of course, the overall orderflow still are tiny in context, but the early trend is visible, and as more traders migrate to IEX it is almost assured that the exchange will become an increasingly more popular venue for the likes of the Schwabs of the world who suddenly, after five years, figured out that HFT is nothing but a cancer and is demanding a non-frontrunnable venue.
[4]
The other statistics reported by IEX are as follows:
[5]