It is common lore that financial institutions are putting their server rooms closer and closer to exchanges’ servers in order to minimise the message latency from financial data feeds. In this week’s New Scientist they look at the problem of working more than 1 exchange – presumably to profit from cross-exchange differences.
A map of these locations, assembled from data on the 53 largest global exchanges, shows that they are scattered across the planet, ranging from the Indian Ocean to remote forests in Canada and Russia. If new computer trading facilities are built at these sites – assuming the infrastructure is in place – they will also improve the liquidity in world markets, says Wissner-Gross.
It would be funny if somewhere like Kenya became the new financial centre of the world!
