NYSE Studying Round-the-Clock Trading

The venerable New York Stock Exchange, long a bastion of resistance to the global push toward 24-hour securities trading, said Friday that it is studying ways of developing a system of off-hours transactions.

The admission by the 198-year-old Big Board was viewed as a reaction to moves by competing stock exchanges to implement fully computerized round-the-clock trading systems that could siphon away business from Wall Street.

Under computerized trading, shares can be traded electronically when the exchange floor is shut down via programs that automatically match up buyers and sellers for various securities.

NYSE spokesman Richard Torrenzano said the exchange plans to discuss the issue with customers, traders, institutional investors, listed companies and securities firms.

“What we’re saying is in the next six to 24 months we’ll be looking at a number of different things,” Torrenzano said.

“We’re not sure there is enough demand to make the NYSE go to 24-hour trading,” Torrenzano added.