In high-speed trading, data is king. If a trader has exclusive information about what the price of a commodity is likely to do next, they can place orders before the market has a chance to adjust. Or rather, that data can go straight into an algorithm that can place the order, making decisions at incredible speeds. These times are measured in milliseconds. In 2015 Hibernia Networks spent $300 million laying a new fiber-optic cable between New York and London to try to reduce communication times by 6 milliseconds. A lot can happen in a thousandth of a second. Let alone six.
