CHAPTER VIII 
THE FLOOR TRADER AND THE SPECIALIST 
Function of Dealer in Maintaining Continuous Market. 
— In Chapter VI we saw two commission brokers, Jenkins and 
Wilkins, meet at the Steel post and conclude a sale of 100 
shares of U. S. Steel common stock. This stock was purposely 
selected in that imaginary transaction, since its comparatively 
broad and continuous market often permits of just such trans- 
actions between commission brokers. In less active and steady 
stocks, however, it might be impossible for one commission 
broker to effect a trade directly with another. Commission 
broker Jenkins might obtain his order in such a stock and pro- 
ceed to the post where it was listed; but the chances are he 
would not happen to find another broker like Wilkins waiting 
there to buy his customer’s stock at just that time, or at a 
mutually satisfactory price. Of course, it takes two to make a 
bargain in the Stock Exchange as elsewhere, and if Jenkins 
cannot find a buyer he cannot sell his customer’s stock. As a 
matter of fact, if Exchange Commission brokers could sell only 
to other commission brokers, cases would constantly arise 
where sales could not be effected for very considerable periods 
of time, with the result that listed securities on the Exchange 
could not possibly possess their present negotiability and com- 
paratively small daily fluctuations in price.? 
In the process of obviating such inability on the part of 
sommission brokers to sell or to buy immediately at a price, 
several classes of dealers have arisen on the floor of the Ex- 
change, who, in the absence of a broker with just the right sort 
of order, stand ready to intervene in such transactions, and at 
" 1See Appendix VIITa, and Chapter II, p. 48. 
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