Patent ID: 7242669

Claim:
A method of selecting from among multiple paths, in a broker-dealer system for automated trading of securities, a path for sending an order for securities to a terminus market, the broker-dealer system including at least one router, the router being coupled for data communications to at least one port, the broker-dealer system including also at least one port, the port being coupled for data communications through at least one path to at least one terminus market, the port optionally including at least one port configuration file, the multiple paths each including at least one direct link between a port and a first-tier market and optionally one or more additional links between the first-tier market and other markets, each of the multiple paths having a first terminus at a port and a second terminus at a terminus market, terminus markets being markets to which orders for securities are sent to be executed, the method comprising the steps of providing one or more path data structures representing a path connecting the broker dealer system to one or more terminus markets, each path data structure further comprising: one or more path identification data elements, and one or more path selection data elements comprising a path status data element; receiving an order comprising an order market code; making calls to API routines, the API routines providing return values; detecting return values that indicate whether a path is available for use in sending orders to a terminus market; recording in the path status data element data representing detected changes in the status of the path; and selecting, from the paths whose path data structures have terminus market codes with values equal to the value of the order market code, a path for the order dependent upon the values of the path selection data elements; wherein one or more of the data elements comprising the path data structure uniquely identifies the path data structure and at least one of the terminus markets is a terminus market in more than one path.