I presume most of you hace seen tis but just in case...from the ECU site....

Here are three paragraphs about High Frequency Traders in the silver market that silver analyst Ted Butler had in his commentary to paid subscribers over the weekend...

"Who are these HFT traders? You guessed it – mostly the big silver shorts, led by JPMorgan and other dominant CME Group members. Only these big traders can afford the million dollar computer hardware and software to run the HFT algorithms. How has it come to the point where giant traders with documented concentrated silver short positions have been further allowed to dominate daily trading volume that causes sharp dives in the price of silver? It is so crazy and outrageous that it should make your blood boil. Believe it or not, I’m trying to contain my outrage. These HFT traders, led by the JPMorgan silver crooks, are like a band of outlaws in the old West who have come to control and terrorize a town and its citizens."

"The central cause of this travesty of a group of crooked traders coming to dominate positions and volume by virtue of concentration is the CME Group. The CME has created this Frankenstein of a market. Because the CME is a for-profit corporation, it is concerned primarily with generating additional profits. Its revenue comes from trading volume, as the CME gets paid for every contract traded. Therefore, it will do anything to increase trading volume, including, I believe, promoting increased volume by illegal means. I would define illegal as including the promotion of practices encouraging concentration, which HFT does."

"Let’s face it – HFT is about massive concentrated computerized day trading designed to manipulate the price and bring in trading revenue to the CME. It’s not about promoting true price discovery and an increase in legitimate hedging, the economic purpose of futures trading. At the exact same time that actual COMEX silver deliveries are hitting historic low levels, electronic volume has hit new highs. This means that COMEX silver is becoming a paper trading mechanism, as opposed to a legitimate futures exchange where real producers and consumers go to hedge. In short, the COMEX is more a bucket shop than a legitimate exchange."