On Frequent Batch Auctions for Stocks

I show that frequent batch auctions for stocks have the potential to reduce the severity of stock price crashes when they occur. For a given sequence of orders from a continuous electronic limit order book market, matching orders using one second apart batch auctions results in nearly the same trades and prices. Increasing the time interval between auctions to one minute significantly reduces the severity stock price crashes. In spite of this and other advantages pointed out in the literature, frequent batch auctions have not caught on. There is a need for carefully designed market experiments to understand why, and what aspect of reality academic research may be missing.Institutional subscribers to the NBER working paper series, and residents of developing countries may download this paper without additional charge at "http://www.nber.org/papers/w26341"