Method and system for facilitating secure transactions
First Claim
1. A method for anonymously and confidentially identifying contraparties to transaction and notifying an authorized representative of the contraparties to contact the contraparties in order to negotiate a transaction, comprising the steps of:
- receiving indications of interest from potential buyers and potential sellers into a central processing system, each indication of interest involving a purchase or sale of a specific item;
anonymously comparing indications of interest received from potential buyers with indications of interest received from potential sellers within the central processing system to determine whether a match has occurred;
identifying contraparties to a transaction based on said determination of whether a match has occurred;
notifying the authorized representative of the contraparties that a match has occurred;
providing contact information to the authorized representative to allow the authorized representative to contact the contraparties so that a transaction can be negotiated between the contraparties; and
consummating the transaction between the contraparties through direct negotiation between the authorized representative and the contraparties.
4 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A secure, computer based method and system for anonymously and confidentially matching indications of interest from potential buyers and sellers is disclosed which facilitates human intervention for negotiating a final transaction between matched parties. Potential buyers and sellers independently enter indications of interest into a central processing system which operates on a network containing a secure station and a plurality of remote user terminals linked to the secure station. The indications identify a security (such as a trading equity), price, type of order, duration, and other related information. A memory at the secure station stores user data and multiple prospective transaction entries received from the user terminals. Indications of interest are compared against those already in the system to determine whether buy side and sell side orders are sufficiently similar to generate a match. When a match occurs, each party and/or its authorized representative is given contact information for the other party and/or its authorized representative to facilitate negotiation of a final transaction. Transacting parties remain anonymous, and transaction information remains confidential, until a match occurs. Transacting parties have an option of adding conditions such as acceptable price, amount and time limits, to their prospective transaction entries. Other options enable parties to place such entries in a pending mode in which the entry is not compared with other entries, and later change the mode form pending to active.
225 Citations
67 Claims
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1. A method for anonymously and confidentially identifying contraparties to transaction and notifying an authorized representative of the contraparties to contact the contraparties in order to negotiate a transaction, comprising the steps of:
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receiving indications of interest from potential buyers and potential sellers into a central processing system, each indication of interest involving a purchase or sale of a specific item;
anonymously comparing indications of interest received from potential buyers with indications of interest received from potential sellers within the central processing system to determine whether a match has occurred;
identifying contraparties to a transaction based on said determination of whether a match has occurred;
notifying the authorized representative of the contraparties that a match has occurred;
providing contact information to the authorized representative to allow the authorized representative to contact the contraparties so that a transaction can be negotiated between the contraparties; and
consummating the transaction between the contraparties through direct negotiation between the authorized representative and the contraparties. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50)
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18. A method for anonymously and confidentially identifying contraparties to a transaction and introducing authorized representatives of each respective contraparty to each other in order for the authorized representatives to negotiate a transaction, comprising the steps of:
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receiving indications of interest from potential buyers and potential sellers into a central processing system, each indication of interest involving a purchase or sale of a specific item;
anonymously comparing indications of interest received from potential buyers with indications of interest from potential sellers within the central processing system to determine whether a match has occurred;
identifying contraparties to a transaction based on said determination of whether a match has occurred;
notifying the contraparties and their respective authorized representatives that a match has occurred;
providing contact information to each of the authorized representatives to allow the authorized representatives of the contraparties to contact each other so that a transaction can be negotiated between the contraparties; and
consummating the transaction between the contraparties through direct negotiation between the authorized representatives of the contraparties.
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35. A method for anonymously and confidentially identifying contraparties to a transaction and disclosing contact information of the contraparties between the contraparties in order to allow them to negotiate a transaction, comprising the steps of:
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receiving indications of interest from potential buyers and potential sellers into a central processing system, each indication of interest involving a purchase or sale of a specific item;
anonymously comparing indications of interest received from potential buyers with indications of interest from potential sellers within the central processing system to determine whether a match has occurred;
identifying contraparties to a transaction based on said determination of whether a match has occurred;
notifying each of the contraparties to a transaction that a match has occurred;
providing contact information to each of the contraparties to a transaction to allow the contraparties to contact each other to negotiate their transaction; and
consummating the transaction between the contraparties through direct negotiation between the contraparties.
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51. An information management system for confidentially identifying contraparties to a transaction and introducing them and/or their agents to each other in order to allow them to negotiate the transaction, consisting of:
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means for receiving indications of interest from potential buyers and potential sellers into a central processing system;
means for confidentially and anonymously comparing the received indications of interest from potential buyers and potential sellers to determine whether a match has occurred, and thus whether contraparties to a transaction have been identified; and
means for informing identified contraparties that a match has occurred and for providing contact information between the identified contraparties so that further negotiations may take place between the contraparties to consummate their mutually desired transaction.
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52. A secure system for facilitating the trading of fungible commodities, including:
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a network, including a secure station and a plurality of remote user terminals having respective user identities and communicatively linked to the secure station for data transmission between the secure station and the user terminals;
a memory at the secure station for storing user data and for storing transaction data in the form of multiple prospective transaction entries received from the user terminals, each of the entries including a fungible item indication and a transaction side indication identifying one of two opposing transaction sides;
a search component operatively coupled to the memory, adapted to perform a comparison of the stored entries with respect to the fungible item indications and the transaction side indications and, based on said comparison, to select sets of two or more of the stored entries as matching entries having the same fungible item indication and together including transaction side indications identifying the opposing transaction sides;
a message sending component operatively coupled to the search component and to the memory and adapted, in response to the selection of each said set of matching entries, to generate a prospective transaction message including the transaction indication and the user identity corresponding to each of the matching entries, and further adapted to provide the prospective transaction message to the user terminals associated with said corresponding user identities, thus to facilitate an interaction among users associated with the user terminals to complete a transaction involving the fungible item; and
a data security component for restricting access to any given prospective transaction entry stored in the memory to (i) the user identity corresponding to the given entry; and
(ii) the user identities corresponding to the other entries in any of said sets of entries that includes the given entry. - View Dependent Claims (53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61)
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62. A process for facilitating the trading of fungible commodities, including:
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receiving, from a plurality of remote user locations, user information including user identities, and transaction information in the form of prospective transaction entries, each of the entries including a fungible item indication and a transaction side indication identifying one of two opposing transaction sides;
storing the user information and the prospective transaction entries to a memory;
searching the memory to perform a comparison of the stored entries with respect to the fungible item indications and the transaction side indications;
based on said comparison, selecting matching entries to form sets of two or more of the matching entries having the same fungible item indication and together including transaction side indications identifying the opposing transaction sides;
in response to selecting each of the sets of entries, generating a prospective transaction message including the transaction indication and user identity corresponding to each of the matching entries, and providing the prospective transaction message to the user locations associated with the corresponding user identities, thereby to enable the associated users to contact one another toward a completion of transaction involving the fungible item; and
restricting access to any given prospective transaction entry to (i) the user identity corresponding to the given entry; and
(ii) the user identities corresponding to the other entries in any of said sets of entries that includes the given entry. - View Dependent Claims (63, 64, 65, 66, 67)
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Specification