Patent ID: 8417617

Claim:
A method of electronically obtaining the best price for an order comprising the steps of: electronically receiving a message identifying eligible market participant types, a security, and a number of shares of the security to include in the order; electronically determining an available quantity of shares and a price of the available shares of the security-at each of a plurality of market participants to create a list of available shares of the security, the market participants comprising public and private electronic communication networks, market makers, exchanges, and broker systems, and the list of available shares of the security comprising the available quantity and the price of the security at each of the plurality of market participants; electronically sorting the list of available shares of the security based at least partly on price and quantity, wherein the sorted list includes only eligible market participant types; electronically parsing the sorted list, by a smart server in a server system, into a plurality of suborders based on the availability and price of the security at each of the plurality of market participants; electronically identifying a subset of the market participants, based at least partly on the number of shares of the security identified in the received message, the determined available quantity of shares of the security at one or more of the plurality of market participants, and the determined price of the available shares of the security at one or more of the plurality of market participants; and electronically and automatically sending at the same time, by the server system, each of the suborders to a respective one of the subset of the plurality of market participants, the one of the subset of the plurality of market participants selected for each suborder having the best available price such that if all of the suborders are filled, the best price is obtained for the order, wherein the step of electronically sending each of the suborders to a respective one of the subset of market participants further comprises the step of electronically sending some of the suborders at a first price and some of the suborders at a second price, and wherein the operations of electronically determining, sorting, parsing, and sending are repeated until the order is fulfilled or canceled.