3 Brokerages to Offer Broker-to-Broker Trade

Merrill Lynch & Co., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities said Tuesday that they plan to start an electronic auction market for stocks that would let investors offer better quotes than those displayed on U.S. markets.

The three brokerages, seeking to position themselves in the rapidly changing electronic securities markets, said they formed a company called Primex Trading that will offer anonymous broker-to-broker trades starting in the second quarter of 2000.

Electronic trading has been prompting cataclysmic changes in the securities markets, giving investors increased autonomy, driving down trading costs and threatening brokers’ traditional roles.

“This is one more indication that Wall Street’s now obsolete and being restructured start to finish,” said University of Northern Colorado finance professor Junius Peake, a former NASD vice chairman.