I run a market making bot. It maintains orders on both sides of the book at 1.3% intervals. When my buy orders are filled, it places a sell 1.3% higher. When my sell orders are filled, it places a buy 1.3% lower. I lose out when it trends continuously, but it stabilizes price and I turn a profit when the bulls and bears duke it out. By keeping orders on the book, I help make it possible for companies like bitpay that need to accurately price and immediately convert bitcoins to USD and companies like bitinstant and coinbase that need to go the other way.
Good job man! If a bunch of people did this, bitcoin would be stable as a rock!
I'm trying to be a market maker, too, just with a slightly different strategy. Best thing is, it's not charity! Market makers earn profits (buy low, sell high) as a reward for the service they do to the system (stability)!
First things first, running a bot is not so easy with bitcoin - because of the volatility. The small % money you make by essentially getting a couple of points greater than inefficient traders (ie. making a few pips on the buy/sell spread) over a period of months can be ereased in 1 day if the price moves 40%. I think with bitcoin a bot is a very difficult way to make money and an easy way to loose. Not to say it cant be done, but dont be fooled into thinking it's easy.
Now, since we're really talking about the volume here and why it's low?
Low volume is a bear signal. Why? Because buyers drive markets. And buyers drive volume. I repeat - buyers drive markets, not sellers! It means, less people are putting money into bitcoin. Sure, less people are selling also, but sellers can only have one effect on the price, to move it downwards. If the lack of buyers (as evidenced by low volumes) continues, you're going to see holders of bitcoins becoming more and more nervous and eventually selling off coins, which will cause a price downtrend, which will equally bring more sellers to market.
A low volume at this stage is a bear sign. Unless bitcoin can bring new money into the market, if low volumes continue we're going to see a continued downwards movement in the price.