Wall Street and New Technology
The roots of modern day Wall Street can be traced back to the signing of the Buttonwood Agreement on May 17th, 1792, which laid the groundwork for what would later become the New York Stock Exchange. Since those earliest days of Wall Street, investors and spectators alike have used the markets to deploy capital as investors or speculators and technological innovation has been a hallmark of the industry.

The current market system is a far cry from the one that traders dealt with during the market's infancy, when people congregated on a street corner to trade. As the market grew, trading moved indoors and a more formalized open-outcry system was developed to ensure fair and efficient markets. Further growth drew increasing interest from investors and institutions around the country and the invention of the ticker tape machine provided a means for quick distribution of prices to these people over large distances. Computer networks eventually replaced the ticker tape and as trading volumes continued to grow, along with the paperwork associated with trading, companies began to rely increasingly on computers for record keeping and eventually trading.

Of the many innovations over the years, computers have had arguably the largest impact since the inception of Wall Street. The quick adoption of computers, and the continued expansion of their use, is largely a result of the transactional nature of the financial markets and the mathematical analysis commonly used to guide trading decisions. These traits together provide a natural match for the speed and efficiency of computer networks. As firms have taken an increasingly computer-based approach to the markets, the rate at which new technologies are introduced in the industry has increased. We believe this trend is likely to continue for the foreseeable future.