Market Making or Proprietary Trading: Volcker distinction

Source : Duffie, Darrell , Market Making Under the Proposed Volcker Rule (January 16, 2012). Rock Center for Corporate Governance at Stanford University Working Paper No. 106. Also available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1990472 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1990472 In a section of the Dodd-Frank Act commonly known as “the Volcker Rule,” Congress banned proprietary trading by banks and their affiliates, but exempted proprietary trading that is related to market making, among other exemptions. Proprietary trading is the purchase and sale of financial instruments with the intent to profit from the difference between the purchase price and the sale price. Market making is proprietary trading that is designed to provide “ immediacy ” to investors. For example, an investor anxious to sell an asset relies on a market maker’s standing ability to buy the asset for itself, immediately. Likewise, an investor who wishes to buy an asset often calls on a mark...