Big Investors Would Gain in a Change at Big Board (NYSE)

[Dover]

Big Investors Would Gain in a Change at Big Board
By FLOYD NORRIS

Published: February 6, 2004


The New York Stock Exchange announced plans yesterday to open electronic trading to institutional investors to a much greater extent than it has before, saying it hoped the move would assure that it would not be damaged by changes the Securities and Exchange Commission is considering for market structure rules.

..snip..

The exchange faces a substantial competitive threat as the S.E.C. weighs changes in market structure, particularly in a rule that electronic exchanges want to change to make it easier for investors to trade on those markets even if their prices are not as good as those on the Big Board.

..snip..

The electronic trading moves announced by the exchange concern its Direct-plus system. Currently, it allows only limit orders - that is, orders to be executed at a particular price - and has a maximum of 1,099 shares for each order. There is also a rule that no single customer can enter a second order into the system within 30 seconds of the first.

The new rules would allow market orders - that is, orders to buy or sell at the market price - to be placed in any size, and would end the 30-second rule. Such orders would be executed almost immediately at the best bid or asked price, up to the limit of the number of shares bid for or offered in the exchange system.

For example, if the market for a stock showed a bid of $30 for 1,000 shares, and 1,500 shares offered at $30.03, an institution that wanted quick action could secure immediate execution of an order to buy the 1,500 shares at $30.03.

The automatic system, however, would not allow investors access to market orders at slightly worse prices, even if there was more liquidity at those levels. In the above case, there might be 50,000 shares offered at $30.04. But the electronic system could not be used to obtain that block until the block at the lower price had been bought..cont'd

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/06/business/06nyse.html

[Dover]

1. Grasso just "one of the boys"

So glad they can find humor in their crimes.......

If Only for a Night, Wall St. Fallen Idol Is One of the Boys

By LANDON THOMAS Jr.

Published: February 6, 2004



Richard A. Grasso is no longer a member of Wall Street's most exclusive public club, the New York Stock Exchange, but he still belongs to its most secretive society, Kappa Beta Phi.

The sole purpose of the society, which claims more than 250 of Wall Street's executives and former chiefs, is to allow some of the biggest egos in finance to poke fun at themselves and to induct new members in a campy rite that dates back to 1929.

At its annual black-tie dinner on Jan. 15 at the St. Regis Hotel, Mr. Grasso was not only in attendance, but the butt of a series of jokes about his $139.5 million pay package as chairman and chief executive of the exchange. Bankers who were there said he took the ribbing in good humor...

..snip..

Among the inductees, or "neophytes" in club parlance, was Diana L. Taylor, the banking superintendent for the Pataki administration and the companion of Mr. Bloomberg.

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/06/business/06WALL.html

[UpInArms]

2. it's so nice to know that our country's financial

institutions are in such capable hands

The customs of the club are in many ways archaic with the feel of a Wall Street version of Yale's Skull and Bones.

and

"It's a secret society," said one Wall Street chief executive and member. "I can't tell you any more, or it wouldn't be secret."

:mad:

[KoKo]

4. Yes, More "Fun & Games" from "Frat Boy" Criminal Elites of Wall St. ...the

same folks who lied and cooked books and stole Pension Money from Retirees and other investors....live on to crook us another day. :grr:

And..this new scheme sounds like something the "Las Vegas/Atlantic City" Crowd would cook up when the gaming tables got slow.

Geeze! Don't they ever learn? NO! Their exclusive club just goes on crooking with just little "hand slaps" for all their malfeasance and skullduggery.......ARGHHHHHH......makes one sick....WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE???

[Moderator]

3. Dover

Per DU copyright rules
please post only four
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Thank you

DU Moderator