A court in Oslo has ruled it was market manipulation. For others, though, it is a tale of how two day traders outwitted the rapid-fire machines that have come to dominate financial markets.

Peder Veiby was trying to earn some money in the stock market to support his studies at the Norwegian School of Management when he was hit by a criminal charge for alleged market manipulation. Now he has found himself at the centre of a landmark legal case involving computer algorithms, or programmes, at the heart of automated trading systems.

Mr Veiby and another Norwegian day trader were handed suspended prison sentences and heavy fines on Wednesday after the court found them guilty of exploiting flaws in the electronic trading platform of a US broker to send “false and misleading signals” to the market.