If true disintermediation were occurring, the airlines would be selling their tickets directly online. Some of them are doing that, but many consumers find it much more convenient to buy through travel agents that serve as information aggregators. Once again, a robust value-added channel sits between the customer and the actual service provider. Expedia may be a travel company that's very different from the traditional agency, but both provide similar functions. Online stock trading also remains a channel-based business.
Customers continue to trade with their broker.
That many customers buy online from Charles Schwab, rather than via telephone from Fidelity, represents a major technology shift but not disintermediation. Disintermediation would require companies to buy and sell their own stock. Experiments in that area exist but remain marginal. In each case, a new online channel is emerging as a strong competitor to traditional retail or telephone-based channels. In each example a high level of coexistence is likely for the foreseeable future, so the Web actually is increasing the total number of active channels, not reducing them.