William O. Brown (University of North Carolina at Greensboro) J. Harold Mulherin (University of Georgia) Marc D. Weidenmier (Claremont McKenna College and NBER)
Abstract
Research on information economics and securities markets dating back to Stigler (Journal of Political Economy, 69 (1961), 213-225; Journal of Business, 37 (1964), 117-142) argues that trading will tend to centralize in major market centers such as the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). The NYSE's recent mergers with Archipelago and Euronext bring questions about the viability and effects of competition between stock exchanges to the policy forefront. We examine the largely forgotten but unparalleled episode of competition between the NYSE and the Consolidated Stock Exchange of New York (Consolidated) from 1885,to 1926. The Consolidated averaged 23% of NYSE volume for approximately forty years by operating a second market for the most liquid securities that traded on the Big Board. Our results suggest that NYSE bid-ask spreads fell by more than 10% when the Consolidated began to trade NYSE stocks and subsequently increased when the Consolidated ceased operations. The empirical analysis suggests that this historical episode of stock market competition improved consumer welfare by an amount equivalent to US$9.6 billion today. (c) 2008 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology..
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.
Volume (Year): 123 (2008) Issue (Month): 4 (November) Pages: 1679-1719 Download reference. The following formats are available: HTML
(with abstract),
plain text
(with abstract),
BibTeX,
RIS (EndNote, RefMan, ProCite),
ReDIF