By John Aidan Byrne, Senior Staff Writer, New York Post
The New York Stock Exchange is back in play — and it may be sold lock, “stock” and building as soon as next year, The Post has learned. Big Board owner Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) is laying the groundwork. The latest all-out drive to make it more profitable, powered by better and faster technology — and a regulatory overhaul to regain market share — is pure window dressing, according to analysts and knowledgeable exchange watchers. This window-dressing could presage the once unthinkable: the closure of the Big Board’s iconic trading floor.
“There is only one move, and that is a sale or spinoff of the NYSE,” said Jim Osman, chief executive of The Edge Consulting Group in London, a research firm that specializes in spinoffs and special situations.