Yesterday the NYSE announced that they will be closing down one of their major trading rooms, affecting 33 brokers:

“This effort will produce cost savings and further increase efficiencies for both the floor firms and the exchange,” said Nelson Chai, the NYSE’s chief financial officer, in a written statement.

As the stock exchange moves to embrace electronic systems, analysts have long predicted the Big Board would scale back its floor operations, based on centuries-old auction-based work handled by brokers and specialists. The London Stock Exchange and many other major stock markets are fully automated.

As the article notes, they are actually somewhat late to the game, yet it still signals a the hardening trend of automation through technology.

Chai said that new technology used by floor brokers and specialists was, in part, responsible for the change. Those traders can handle increasing order volume with greater speed and efficiency, he said.

…

Some analysts said the NYSE would eventually abandon specialists and floor brokers and move to a wholly electronic system. Jerry Putnam, the Big Board’s chief technology officer, said last week “we made a decision not to decide” about the future of the trading floor.

And it won’t be long now until everything is automated. Just think, that image we all have of a bustling Wall St. exchange floor will soon be nothing but a memory of simpler times.