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Siphoned Apart: A Portfolio Perspective on Order Flow Segmentation, Journal of Financial Economics
Abstract
We study liquidity supply in fragmented markets. Market makers intermediate heterogeneous order flows, trading off spread revenue against inventory costs. Applying our model to payment for order flow (PFOF), we demonstrate that portfolio-based considerations of inventory management incentivize market makers to segment retail orders by siphoning them off-exchange. Banning order flow segmentation reduces total welfare, can make trading more costly for all investors, and can resolve a prisoner’s dilemma among market makers. These results differentiate our inventory-based model from the existing information-based theories of PFOF.
Type
Article
Author(s)
Markus Baldauf, Joshua Mollner, Bart Zhou Yueshen
Date Published
2024
Citations
Baldauf, Markus, Joshua Mollner, and Bart Zhou Yueshen. 2024. Siphoned Apart: A Portfolio Perspective on Order Flow Segmentation. Journal of Financial Economics. 154: Art. 103807.
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