Trading games: Online stock trading gets faster by going wireless

The brokerage world thinks wireless trading is hot. That's good news for wireless operators because those brokers are driving traffic to wireless networks and the operators don't have to do much to help.

"There's a changing trend that telecom companies are interested in this in order to keep consumers using their service," said Karin Hermann, chief operating officer for w-Trade, a software company that specializes in wireless trading products. "They want to offer suites of financial services in the hopes of attracting a larger clientele."

In addition to attracting customers to their services, wireless trading can help operators control churn.

"To the extent that operators can offer packages of enhanced services of various kinds that make users tied to their phones and the network, it helps reduce churn," said Steve Wood, president and CEO of Wireless Services Corp., a wireless messaging and e-mail solutions company.

Wireless Services recently teamed with Xypoint - known for its wireless E911 products - to develop products that enable wireless e-commerce. The companies plan to introduce during the fourth quarter a unique platform, called WebWireless, which should help increase airtime for operators.

"Our whole philosophy is blending text or data with voice," said Ken Arneson, president and CEO of Xypoint. For example, one application might alert users when a stock price dips below a point set by the user. When users receive the alert, which is most likely generated by the broker, they also will receive a message instructing them to press the talk button if they want to sell. The call then is connected to WebWireless' voice processing center, which is connected to the broker's voice system. The key is that when WebWireless receives the calls, it knows who the callers are and why they are calling. As a result, the caller doesn't have to work through a lengthy series of prompts, Arneson said.

The voice piece of that process has value for a few reasons. "There are 30 to 40 million phones...that have text messaging but no back channel capability," said Wood. WebWireless allows those phone owners to trade wirelessly. "Even if you have two-way messaging, voice may a lot of times be a better interface," he said. For instance, if customers are driving, it might be more convenient to conduct the transaction via voice rather than data.

The brokerage community has high hopes for wireless trading. Investrade, a w-Trade customer, believes that when wireless networks become more reliable and have higher data speeds, wireless trading will become even more popular.

"It's just going to grow exponentially," said George Bokios, president of Investrade. Investrade offers a free smart phone to customers with $10,000 equity. The end-user signs up for a service contract for AT&T's Pocketnet service via Investrade's Web site.

To trade wirelessly using services that run on w-Trade software, end-users must have must have a device with a browser. W-Trade has dealer agreements with AT&T Wireless for its cellular digital packet data network and BellSouth for its data network, though such relationships aren't necessary for w-Trade to interact with end-users.

While w-Trade's Hermann sees growing interest from the operator community, others believe carriers will play a small role in pursuing e-commerce and wireless trading services.

"I think the future will be driven by content providers more than carriers in the United States because carriers are slow and scared to implement many services here," said Alan Reiter, president of Wireless Internet & Mobile Computing.