Patent ID: 7020630

Claim:
A method for automatically effecting securities trades comprising the steps of: determining the first instance of the most recent preceding transaction price of a security together with a current average price of said security, said current average price of said security corresponding to an average of a predetermined number of preceding transaction prices thereof; determining the delay between said preceding transactions and a second instance of the most recent delayed transaction price of said security together with a delayed average price of said security, said delayed average price of said security corresponding to an average of a predetermined number of delayed transaction prices thereof; subtracting said most recent transaction price from said current average price to provide a current price difference and said delayed transaction price from said delayed average price to provide a delayed price difference; performing a correlation analysis based on said delay between said current price difference and said delayed price difference to produce a correlation coefficient therebetween; accumulating said correlation coefficients to produce a distribution thereof; converting said distribution to a normal distribution; displaying bracketing intervals corresponding to the various probabilities of said normal distribution; and effecting a securities trade order by selecting a price together with a selected one of said bracketing intervals.