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Non-Tech : Ashton Technology (ASTN) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sir Auric Goldfinger who wrote (2133)	7/21/1999 2:53:00 PM
From: mst2000	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 4443

If I were Island or NITE, I might be concerned about the announcement you posted from Fidelity Schwab and 2 others. That's because they are ECNs (or ECNs in development). Let's do a little remedial reading on ECNs and Alternative Trading Systems: ATG's VTS system is an ATS aimed at institutions. It does not compete with ECNs, who match electronic orders from (mostly) retail buyers and sellers, trading in an auction environment, thereby eliminating the spread between bid and asked prices and snatching order flow from the traditional path of specialists and market makers, in exchange for executions at a few pennies per share. VTS is an ATS - it is not an auction based system, but rather offers anonymous trading at an industry accepted, theoretically fairest pricing standard (the mathematically precise VWAP of shares traded the regular way in widely held, widely traded NYSE listed securities). The pre-session matching process with prices set at the VWAP after the close represents a completely different way of executing trades at a theoretically fair price than has existed to date. It bears no resemblance to an "auction" where there is price disclosure going in, and bears little resemblance to an ECN (electronic orders and anonymity are the only items in common - there is NO price disclosure). If you would integrate those distinctions into your thinking, maybe you will stop wasting our time posting articles about ECNs as if they have some huge impact on VTS. I know that you think VTS isn't going to fly with institutions -- And you know I think institutions will embrace it with a lot more enthusiasm than you believe possible. Time will tell who is right and who is wrong. Let's pick that one up and discuss it again about a year from now, when results are fairly capable of being interpreted. I agree with you that POSIT is a dinosaur. It is also experiencing trading volumes much higher than ever before and making tons of money. That fact bodes well for any competitor (or erstwhile competitor) in that industry. I think that was EyeDrMike's point. POSIT has been operational for over a decade (13 years?). Of course it is a cash cow - comparing its cash position to that of a development stage company like Ashton which has had no significant revenue to speak of is a little like comparing the cash position of AtHome to AOL, or AMD to Intel. Same industry, but vastly different stages of maturity. Doesn't mean AtHome and AMD wont be a huge cash cows in 10 years - just that they are spending what revenue they now have to continue to build its franchise and the infrastructure necessary to compete with companies like AOL and Intel, respectively. Your continual filing of 144's for little restricted shareholders is tiresome and meaningless. And I do not charge my clients for the time I spend posting here (or on Yahoo) - I post on my own time. But I should start charging you for all the free legal advice I have been giving you regarding the law of defamation. And you could use the advice, FWIW. MST