Levels the playing field for retail investors.<p>If your entire strategy is arbitrage, then of course you&#x27;re going to lose out to someone who is quicker and has better technology.  Of course some people who lost out on &#x27;low hanging fruit&#x27; are going to be mad someone else bought a bigger ladder.<p>But if your strategy is anything else (investing or any type of speculative trading) then HFT benefits you.<p>I&#x27;ve traded on markets with low liquidity and no HFT, and high liquidity with HFT.  I don&#x27;t miss the low-liquidity markets, waiting half a day to see your order executed only to see the price move against you because no one could match your order, meanwhile institutional traders are trading the same stock outside the exchange is the worst kind of infuriating.<p>The argument against HFT is like saying that bank tellers who exchange currency for a 2% spread are cheating out back-alley money changers who take a 20% spread...  Yes someone is losing, but it&#x27;s not necessarily a bad thing.