Dean Witter Ends Program Trading: Dean Witter...

Dean Witter Ends Program Trading: Dean Witter Reynolds Inc., the Sears, Roebuck & Co. brokerage unit, said it no longer will handle computer program trading and criticized other brokerages that do. A spokesman for the firm said Dean Witter pulled out of program trading because “it threatened the integrity of the market in customers’ minds.” Blamed by some as the cause of stock market volatility around the time of the 1987 crash, program trading virtually disappeared for a time because of a self-imposed ban by Wall Street firms; recently it has made a strong comeback.