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

To: wily who wrote (2293)	8/6/1999 1:51:00 PM
From: mst2000	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 4443

wily - interesting question Putting aside the remoteness of that possibility (I can see the specialists giving up their livelihood without a battle royale), I'm not sure it would have an effect on a derivative pricing model like VWAP. Here's my thinking: Both NYSE and NASDAQ are now, effectively, ECNs - as I understand it, almost 80% of the trades now made on the NYSE are made electronically, without actually executing the bid through a live specialist on the floor of the exchange. Most NASDAQ trading is now handled through NASDAQ's central limit order book, with some of the newer ECNs eating into the volume, but posting orders not filled internally by that ECN through NASDAQ's central limit order book (e.g., if unmatched within some finite time period). So the pool of "liquidity" that you are talking about largely exists today, if not in a 100% unified sense. Yet individuals (B/Ds and others) still place the orders, and execute them, and would under your scenario -- the B/D's would be aware of them, as they are now when they look at their computer screens. I can't even begin to imagine the IT issues raised by such a system (a seamless, anonymous all electronic pathway with no human intervention) given the volume of individual trades, so assume some human intervention would be necessary (wholly apart from the insistence of the humans involved that they be permitted to continue to operate and make $$$ off the system). If that occurs, then the anonymity feature is still not present, so that the front-running concern that makes VTS so attractive still exists. More importantly, VWAP as executed through VTS would still give those process driven traders who want a theoretically fair priced execution without timing their trades an avenue to achieve that. so might it have an effect - I suppose so - but it would not put VTS out of business, because there would still be demand for the derivative pricing structure. IMHO, of course. An interesting scenario - though a huge stretch - a long way off, if ever. MST