Markets : Can They Really Be Tamed ?

On computer-driven, automatic trading strategies :

Cobras are revered in Indian culture, but the British Raj took a dimmer view of the poisonous snake. Officials promised a lucrative reward for every dead serpent — a scheme that, according to economic lore, backfired horribly.

Enterprising Indians began breeding cobras to collect the bounty, which forced the colonial government to abandon the plan. The frustrated breeders then released the worthless cobras, worsening the infestation. The story has never been fully confirmed by historians, but was seized on by German economist Horst Siebert, who in 2001 published The Cobra Effect on perverse incentives and unintended consequences. The book turned the anecdote into a potent example of how solutions to a problem can make it worse.

→ The Financial Times