Methods and systems for market clearance
First Claim
1. A system for clearing binding offers, each of which specifies conditions for acceptance, the system comprising:
- a processing unit;
an input/output device coupled to the processing unit;
a storage device in communication with the processing unit, the storage device including,program code for receiving a plurality of binding advantaged offers each having a respective requested close time, wherein an advantaged offer is one which, once associated with a given disadvantaged offer, will necessarily be transacted upon, either in accordance with terms originally associated with the advantaged offer, or in accordance with better terms;
program code for associating individual binding advantaged offers with individual available most-favorable binding disadvantaged offers each having a respective close time, wherein the conditions of acceptance of the individual binding advantaged offers are met by respective binding disadvantaged offers;
program code for changing the association of one of the individual binding associated advantaged offers to a newly available binding disadvantaged offer that offers more favorable terms than a currently associated binding disadvantaged offer, when the newly available binding disadvantaged offer is received and meets the conditions of acceptance of the associated binding advantaged offer, wherein the step of changing the association is performed in order of chronological priority of receipt of the binding advantaged offers;
program code for, at a time based on respective requested close times of associated individual binding advantaged offers and binding disadvantaged offers, clearing the associated individual binding advantaged offers and binding disadvantaged offers to produce cleared individual binding advantaged offers and binding disadvantaged offers; and
program code for transmitting transaction directives to transacting buyers and sellers associated respectively with the cleared individual binding advantaged offers and binding disadvantaged offers.
1 Assignment
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
In a marketplace, offers are processed that are intended to be associated with other offers in a pool. The offers specify conditions for acceptance. Improvable offers are received that are capable of being associated with offers having more favorable specifications than initial offers associated with the improvable offers. Nonimprovable offers that have more favorable specifications than initial offers associated with improvable offers are identified. The identified nonimprovable offers are associated with corresponding improvable offers. Straddles, which comprise a set of offers and a limit on the associations, may span multiple pools. Information about the marketplace may be obtained from data generated by the operation of the marketplace.
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Citations
25 Claims
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1. A system for clearing binding offers, each of which specifies conditions for acceptance, the system comprising:
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a processing unit; an input/output device coupled to the processing unit; a storage device in communication with the processing unit, the storage device including, program code for receiving a plurality of binding advantaged offers each having a respective requested close time, wherein an advantaged offer is one which, once associated with a given disadvantaged offer, will necessarily be transacted upon, either in accordance with terms originally associated with the advantaged offer, or in accordance with better terms; program code for associating individual binding advantaged offers with individual available most-favorable binding disadvantaged offers each having a respective close time, wherein the conditions of acceptance of the individual binding advantaged offers are met by respective binding disadvantaged offers; program code for changing the association of one of the individual binding associated advantaged offers to a newly available binding disadvantaged offer that offers more favorable terms than a currently associated binding disadvantaged offer, when the newly available binding disadvantaged offer is received and meets the conditions of acceptance of the associated binding advantaged offer, wherein the step of changing the association is performed in order of chronological priority of receipt of the binding advantaged offers; program code for, at a time based on respective requested close times of associated individual binding advantaged offers and binding disadvantaged offers, clearing the associated individual binding advantaged offers and binding disadvantaged offers to produce cleared individual binding advantaged offers and binding disadvantaged offers; and program code for transmitting transaction directives to transacting buyers and sellers associated respectively with the cleared individual binding advantaged offers and binding disadvantaged offers. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18)
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19. A system for clearing offers, comprising:
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a processing unit; an input/output device coupled to the processing unit; a storage device in communication with the processing unit, the storage device including; program code for receiving a plurality of buyer offers and a plurality of seller offers, wherein each of the offers includes a plurality of attributes including a requested close time; program code for locking individual buyer offers in chronological order of receipt of the buyer offers with a most-buyer-favorable of the then-available individual seller offers when respective conditions of acceptance defined by the plurality of attributes are met; program code for unlocking a previously-locked buyer offer/seller offer pair when a new seller offer is subsequently received that has conditions of acceptance that are better than conditions of acceptance of the seller offer of the previously-locked buyer offer/seller offer pair and relocking the buyer offer to the newly-received more-favorable seller offer, wherein such unlocking and relocking is performed in chronological order of receipt of the buyer offers; program code for, at a predetermined time based on respective requested close times of locked buyer offer/seller offer pairs, clearing such locked buyer offer/seller offer pairs; and program code for transmitting transaction directives to respective buyers and sellers of the locked and now-cleared buyer offer/seller offer pairs. - View Dependent Claims (20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25)
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Specification