Automated system for providing liquidity to securities markets

Claim 1

An on-line interactive investment processing system for managing in a real time environment one or more investor portfolios each having an inventory including numerous and diverse securities and each having separate portfolio objectives represented by a specified desired mix of investments in securities and cash reserves through generation of buy and sell orders on behalf of each of those portfolios comprising: first storage means for collecting and storing securities transaction data and price quotation data both from a plurality of securities markets external to the system and from buy and sell orders and transactions generated internal to the system; controller means for accessing the data stored in said first storage means, for analyzing the data stored in said first storage means and for substantially simultaneously transacting multiple purchases and sales of a plurality of securities for one or more of the investor portfolios; second storage means coupled to said controller means for collecting and storing data for each investor portfolio concerning the status of that particular portfolio and for transmitting buy and sell orders on behalf of that particular portfolio to said controller means; investor computer means separately associated with each investor portfolio and coupled to said second storage means for analyzing the data concerning the status of the portfolio of that particular investor and for generating buy and sell orders for transmission to said second storage means on behalf of that portfolio which buy and sell orders retain the portfolio objectives while simultaneously providing liquidity to the securities market; third storage means coupled to said controller means for collecting and storing data concerning the portfolios of all investors using the system; supervisory computer means coupled to said third storage means for supervising and ensuring the proper functioning of the system; external data terminal means coupled to said controller means for linking said controller means to external automated securities brokers and exchanges and for transmitting orders and transaction data to external automated securities brokers and exchanges; trade data terminal means coupled to said controller means for reporting all executed sales internal to the system to a central reporting house; and settlement data terminal means coupled to said controller means for reporting all trades involving individual securities for settlement purposes to an external organization.

Claim 17

A method for interactively managing a plurality of internally linked investor portfolios, each having an inventory including numerous and diverse securities traded in securities markets and each having separate portfolio objectives represented by a specified desired mix of investments in securities and cash reserves comprising the steps of: updating data files on a daily basis to reflect corporate actions relating to all managed securities; updating data files on an ongoing basis with current market information concerning the variance of the price fluctuations of each managed security; updating data files on an ongoing basis with current market information concerning the normal price of each managted security; analyzing and altering the desired mix of investments in securities and cash reserves for each investor based on changes in portfolio objectives; analyzing said variance data, said normal price data and said portfolio objectives; generating one or more sets of buy and/or sell orders for securities at specific prices; offering all buy and sell orders first to other internally linked investors for real time matching and execution; and offering any buy and sell orders remaining unexecuted after having been offered to said other internally linked institutional investors to external automated traders for substantially real time matching and execution.

Claim 18

A method for interactively managing a plurality of internally linked investor portfolios, each having an inventory including numerous and diverse securities traded in securities markets and each having separate portfolio objectives represented by a specified desired mix of investments in securities and cash reserves comprising the steps of: updating data files on a daily basis to reflect corporate actions relating to all managed securities; updating data files on an ongoing basis with current market information concerning the variance of the price fluctuations of each managed security; updating data files on an ongoing basis with current market information concerning the normal price of each managted security; analyzing and altering the desired mix of investments in securities and cash reserves for each investor based on changes in portfolio objectives; analyzing said variance data, said normal price data and said portfolio objectives; generating one or more sets of buy and/or sell orders for securities at specific prices; offering all buy and sell orders first to other internally linked investors for real time matching and execution; and offering any buy and sell orders remaining unexecuted after having been offered to said other internally linked institutional investors to external automated traders for substantially real time matching and execution.