What I would lie to know is if these HFT programs can intercept...

What I would lie to know is if these HFT programs can intercept my order going through , interpret it & in a flash adjust theirs accordingly before mine ??

I ask as I thought I would wipe that .165 line out & for an experiment I jotted down the time , as per the official Internet time , of when I pressed confirm & it was before the time registered by those two bot trades ...by more than several seconds .. Maybe the slowness at that time of the Westpac site but it does make me wonder .

Also wouldn't put it past the banks to be in on the whole game & they are setting their algorithms to what we are placing & beating us to the punch .
Has been in my mind for sometime but surely not as this would be , sadly yet again , another sign of the worst the financial big wigs can come up .

Any thoughts appreciated .