>I understand the historical struggle these resource allocation machines (how I think of them)
That might have been the case in the past, but I feel the current HFT driven market has little to do with resource allocation (or even funding companies for that matter).
HFT doesn't drive the market. The market is driven by pension funds, mutual funds, sovereign wealth funds, banks, corporations investing on their own behalf, and private equity funds and hedge funds. HFT traders act as intermediaries when these big players make transactions, but they don't have much to do with market functions like resource allocation. They can't. They don't take positions.
That might have been the case in the past, but I feel the current HFT driven market has little to do with resource allocation (or even funding companies for that matter).