David Fuller's view I received a call from a journalist in Moscow this afternoon who asked for my comments on a report, from JPMorgan, as I recall.

I have not seen the report but apparently the 250 biggest S&P 500 stocks had a correlation in directional price moves of 81% in August. I was also told that this was way above the historical average of approximately 30% and the highest since October 1987's 88% when the stock market crash occurred.

I was asked if investors had given up on fundamentals and were just concentrating on very short-term momentum trading? I said it had almost nothing to do with investors. Instead, it was caused by high-frequency trading.

In other words, the terminator machines are in charge and not just in US large-cap stocks. Similarly high correlations have been evident in a number of other stock markets and also commodities, bonds and currencies.

It is about time regulators did something about it, because high-frequency trading is destabilising, predatory and involves front-running. Nevertheless exchanges love it because the increased turnover boosts their bottom line.

High-frequency trading has nothing to do with the formation of capital, which is the main reason for markets. It does not require the imagination of a science fiction writer to realise that, unchecked, this practice will end badly.