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U.S. patents reveal "technological arms race" in Wall Street: New Zealand study

Xinhua, January 26, 2015 Adjust font size:

New Zealand researchers said Monday they have traced the origins of a "technological arms race" that gives Wall Street an advantage in the international markets.

The University of Otago researchers scanned the United States Patent and Trademark Office database for market infrastructure (MI) patents for software or hardware using in trading filed between January 1976 and December 2013.

"Trading a share -- once a hands-on transaction taking around two minutes -- is now handled in mere nanoseconds by computers in many markets around the world," study co-author Dr Ivan Diaz- Rainey said in a statement.

"A technology arms race is well underway as firms vie to shave even more time off trading and maintain their competitive edge. But it's not just about trading speed. We're seeing technology used more when firms are first issuing securities and even the use of neural networks in portfolio selection."

The study was the first to use U.S. patent data to examine which firms had led the transformation and what pattern it had taken.

"Established economic theory tells us that new firms will play a leading role in transforming an industry. However, traditional finance firms are powerful and commercially astute so it is reasonable to assume at least some will have responded aggressively by patenting new MI technologies themselves," said Diaz-Rainey.

"We identified software companies and smaller brokerage firms that have invested heavily in technology internally and through market acquisitions, right alongside major incumbent firms like the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and Goldman Sachs."

The study revealed that the leading MI patentee was not an established firm, but a private software firm, Trading Technologies International.

It showed the MI revolution began in the mid-to-late 1990s and had been more intense in comparison to general patent filing levels of the same time period.

The analysis may be of interest in markets that were less technology driven, such as New Zealand's, and could help inform regulators considering shifting toward computerized high frequency trading.

"At a basic level, all markets are increasingly integrated -- if Wall Street sneezes, New Zealand is likely to catch a financial cold. So I guess a question is do we want to move towards this?" said Diaz-Rainey. Endi