Method for scheduling future orders on an electronic commodity trading system

Abstract

A method is provided for placing a trade order for a commodity on an electronic exchange to da executed at a future time, said method composing the steps of displaying a trading screen for a commodity market, said trading screen including a future time schedule and an order entry region corresponding to each future time segment of the future time schedule, and scheduling an order corresponding to a future time segment by locating a pointer of a user device within an order entry region corresponding to the future time segment and sending an input signal via the pointer.

1 . A method for placing a trade order for a commodity on an electronic exchange to be executed at a futures time, said method comprising the steps of:
 displaying a trading screen for a commodity market, said trading screen including a future time schedule and an order entry region corresponding to each future time segment of the future time schedule; and   scheduling an order corresponding to a future time segment by locating a pointer of a user device within an order entry region corresponding to the future time segment and sending an input signal via the pointer.   
   
   
       2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the order is a buy order and the order entry region is a buy order entry region. 
   
   
       3 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the order is a sell order and the order entry region is a sell order entry region. 
   
   
       4 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the order is a buy order, and further comprising the step of:
 scheduling a buy order corresponding to a future time segment by locating the pointer of a user device within a buy order entry region corresponding to the future time segment and sending an input signal via the pointer.   
   
   
       5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the order is a sell order, and further comprising the step of:
 scheduling a sell order corresponding to a future time segment by locating the pointer of a user device within a sell order entry region corresponding to the future time segment and sending an input signal via the pointer.   
   
   
       6 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the future time segments of the trading screen are chronologically incremented in equal time segments. 
   
   
       7 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the trading screen includes a grid of columns and rows, wherein at least some of the rows correspond to future time segments, and a column is designated as a buy column and another column is designated as a sell column. 
   
   
       8 . The method of  claim 7 , wherein said grid comprises cells corresponding to buy order entry regions and cells corresponding to sell order entry regions. 
   
   
       9 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the input device comprises a mouse of a computer. 
   
   
       10 . The method of  claim 9 , wherein the user sends an input signal by pressing an input button on the mouse. 
   
   
       11 . The method of  claim 9 , wherein the pointer of a user device is a display arrow of the computer mouse. 
   
   
       12 . A computer readable medium having program code recorded thereon for execution on a computer for placing a trade order for a commodity on an electronic exchange in be executed at a future time, said program code causing a machine to execute the a method comprising the steps of:
 displaying a trading screen for a commodity market, said trading screen including a future time schedule and an order entry region corresponding to each future time segment of the future time schedule: and   scheduling an enter corresponding to a future time segment by locating a pointer of a user device within an order entry region corresponding to the future time segment and sending an input signal via the pointer.