Trading Stocks in America: Key Policy Issues

American stock markets are important to our economy and their efficiency and effectiveness impacts the broad economy. How can we build on their strengths and tackle areas of concern to achieve the best combination of economic efficiency and fairness?

On January 30, the Economic Studies Program at Brookings held an event to discuss key current policy issues, including dark pools and their operations, payment for order flow, and the rules for ensuring best execution of customer orders. Martin Baily moderated a panel with Gregg E. Berman of the Securities Exchange Commission, Douglas Elliott of Brookings, Chester Spatt of Carnegie Mellon Tepper School of Business, and Daniel G. Weaver of Rutgers Business School, to frame the topic. Douglas Elliott moderated a second panel that discussed the differing policy views of these issues. Panelists included Ari Burstein of the Investment Company Institute, Brian Conroy of Fidelity Capital Markets, Jamil Nazarali of Citadel Securities, and Thomas A. Wittman of NASDAQ OMX.