IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cup/jechis/v67y2007i03p705-739_00.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Highest Price Ever: The Great NYSE Seat Sale of 1928–1929 and Capacity Constraints

Author

Listed:
  • Davis, Lance E.
  • Neal, Larry
  • White, Eugene

Abstract

During the 1920s the New York Stock Exchange's position as the dominant American exchange was eroding. Costs to customers, measured as bid-ask spreads, spiked when surging inflows of orders collided with the constraint created by a fixed number of brokers. The NYSE's management proposed and the membership approved a 25 percent increase in the number of seats by issuing a quarter-seat dividend to all members. An event study reveals that the aggregate value of the NYSE rose in anticipation of improved competitiveness. These expectations were justified as bid-ask spreads became less sensitive to peak volume days.

Suggested Citation

  • Davis, Lance E. & Neal, Larry & White, Eugene, 2007. "The Highest Price Ever: The Great NYSE Seat Sale of 1928–1929 and Capacity Constraints," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 67(3), pages 705-739, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:jechis:v:67:y:2007:i:03:p:705-739_00
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S0022050707000289/type/journal_article
    File Function: link to article abstract page
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Golbe, Devra L., 1986. "Has deregulation decreased the risk of NYSE seat ownership?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 283-289.
    2. Stoll, Hans R, 1978. "The Supply of Dealer Services in Securities Markets," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 33(4), pages 1133-1151, September.
    3. Jarrell, Gregg A, 1984. "Change at the Exchange: The Causes and Effects of Deregulation," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 27(2), pages 273-312, October.
    4. Unknown, 1986. "Letters," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 1(4), pages 1-9.
    5. Schwert, G. William, 1977. "Stock exchange seats as capital assets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 4(1), pages 51-78, January.
    6. Madhavan, Ananth, 2000. "Market microstructure: A survey," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 3(3), pages 205-258, August.
    7. Easley, David & O'Hara, Maureen, 1987. "Price, trade size, and information in securities markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(1), pages 69-90, September.
    8. Donald B. Keim & Ananth Madhavan, 2000. "The Relation between Stock Market Movements and NYSE Seat Prices," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(6), pages 2817-2840, December.
    9. Donald B. Keim & Ananth Madhavan, "undated". "The Information Contained in Stock Exchange Seat Prices," Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research Working Papers 7-98, Wharton School Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research.
    10. S. Baranzoni & P. Bianchi & L. Lambertini, 2000. "Multiproduct Firms, Product Differentiation, and Market Structure," Working Papers 368, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    11. Kojo Menyah & Krishna Paudyal, 1996. "The Determinants And Dynamics Of Bid-Ask Spreads On The London Stock Exchange," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 19(3), pages 377-394, September.
    12. G. William Schwert, 1977. "Public Regulation of National Securities Exchanges: A Test of the Capture Hypothesis," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 8(1), pages 128-150, Spring.
    13. Kojo Menyah & Krishna Paudyal, 1996. "The Determinants And Dynamics Of Bid-Ask Spreads On The London Stock Exchange," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 19(3), pages 377-394, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Alexandru Preda, 2012. "The Social Closure of the Stock Exchange," Chapters, in: Geoffrey Poitras (ed.), Handbook of Research on Stock Market Globalization, chapter 6, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Moser, Petra, 2012. "Taste-based discrimination evidence from a shift in ethnic preferences after WWI," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 49(2), pages 167-188.
    3. Bruno Biais & Richard Green, 2019. "The Microstructure of the Bond Market in the 20th Century," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 33, pages 250-271, July.
    4. Neal, Larry & White, Eugene N., 2012. "The Glass–Steagall Act in historical perspective," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 104-113.
    5. White, Eugene N., 2013. "Competition among the exchanges before the SEC: was the NYSE a natural hegemon?," Financial History Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 20(1), pages 29-48, April.
    6. Jose A. Scheinkman, 2013. "Speculation, Trading and Bubbles Third Annual Arrow Lecture," Working Papers 1458, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Econometric Research Program..
    7. Pierre-Cyrille Hautcoeur & Amir Rezaee & Angelo Riva, 2018. "Competition among Securities Markets," Working Papers halshs-01863942, HAL.
    8. Pierre-Cyrille Hautcoeur & Amir Rezaee & Angelo Riva, 2023. "Competition between securities markets: stock exchange industry regulation in the Paris financial center at the turn of the twentieth century," Cliometrica, Springer;Cliometric Society (Association Francaise de Cliométrie), vol. 17(2), pages 261-299, May.
    9. Bernard Mcsherry & Berry K. Wilson & James J. Mcandrews, 2017. "Net Settlement and Counterparty Risk: Evidence from the Formation of the New York Stock Exchange Clearing House in 1892," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 49(6), pages 1273-1298, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Moser, Petra, 2012. "Taste-based discrimination evidence from a shift in ethnic preferences after WWI," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 49(2), pages 167-188.
    2. Battalio, Robert & Hatch, Brian & Loughran, Tim, 2011. "Who benefited from the disclosure mandates of the 1964 Securities Acts Amendments?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 17(4), pages 1047-1063, September.
    3. Pu Shen & Ross M. Starr, 2000. "Market makers' supply and pricing of financial market liquidity," Research Working Paper RWP 00-03, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
    4. Havran, Dániel & Erb, Tamás, 2015. "Mit veszítünk a piaci súrlódásokkal?. A pénzügyi piacok mikrostruktúrája [Trading mechanisms and market frictions. Microstructure of the financial markets]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(3), pages 229-262.
    5. PASCUAL, Roberto & VEREDAS, David, 2006. "Does the open limit order book matter in explaining long run volatility ?," LIDAM Discussion Papers CORE 2006110, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    6. G. Wuyts, 2007. "Stock Market Liquidity.Determinants and Implications," Review of Business and Economic Literature, KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), Review of Business and Economic Literature, vol. 0(2), pages 279-316.
    7. Phillip Monin, 2014. "Hedging Market Risk in Optimal Liquidation," Working Papers 14-08, Office of Financial Research, US Department of the Treasury.
    8. Vayanos, Dimitri & Wang, Jiang, 2013. "Market Liquidity—Theory and Empirical Evidence ," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1289-1361, Elsevier.
    9. Ozsoylev, Han N. & Takayama, Shino, 2010. "Price, trade size, and information revelation in multi-period securities markets," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 13(1), pages 49-76, February.
    10. Maureen O'Hara, 2001. "Overview: market structure issues in market liquidity," BIS Papers chapters, in: Bank for International Settlements (ed.), Market liquidity: proceedings of a workshop held at the BIS, volume 2, pages 1-8, Bank for International Settlements.
    11. Xinyang Li & Andreas Krause, 2010. "Determining the optimal market structure using near-zero intelligence traders," Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination, Springer;Society for Economic Science with Heterogeneous Interacting Agents, vol. 5(2), pages 155-167, December.
    12. Medina, Vicente & Pardo, Ángel & Pascual, Roberto, 2014. "The timeline of trading frictions in the European carbon market," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 378-394.
    13. Ledenyov, Dimitri O. & Ledenyov, Viktor O., 2015. "Wave function method to forecast foreign currencies exchange rates at ultra high frequency electronic trading in foreign currencies exchange markets," MPRA Paper 67470, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Arango, Ignacio & Agudelo, Diego A., 2019. "How does information disclosure affect liquidity? Evidence from an emerging market," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    15. Shen, Pu & Starr, Ross M., 2002. "Market-makers' supply and pricing of financial market liquidity," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 76(1), pages 53-58, June.
    16. Hatch, Brian C. & Johnson, Shane A., 2002. "The impact of specialist firm acquisitions on market quality," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 139-167, October.
    17. Brian Prucyk, 2005. "Specialist Risk Attitudes and the Bid‐Ask Spread," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 40(2), pages 223-255, May.
    18. Taylor, Nicholas, 2002. "The economic and statistical significance of spread forecasts: Evidence from the London Stock Exchange," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 795-818, April.
    19. Andrew Grant & Anastasios Oikonomidis & Alistair C. Bruce & Johnnie E. V. Johnson, 2018. "New entry, strategic diversity and efficiency in soccer betting markets: the creation and suppression of arbitrage opportunities," The European Journal of Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(18), pages 1799-1816, December.
    20. BEAUPAIN, Renaud & GIOT, Pierre & PETITJEAN, Mikael, 2006. "Market-wide liquidity co-movements, volatility regimes and market cap sizes," LIDAM Discussion Papers CORE 2006102, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • N2 - Economic History - - Financial Markets and Institutions
    • G2 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cup:jechis:v:67:y:2007:i:03:p:705-739_00. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kirk Stebbing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cambridge.org/jeh .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.