1. A parallel data path rounding normalizer for floating point arithmetic operations comprising four parallel data paths for taking a mantissa having close enough bits and picky bits and producing a correctly rounded mantissa, said data paths comprising: a. a 1X.XX. .. X data path for mantissas greater than or equal to 2 but less than 4, said data path having means for right shifting the close enough bits and adjusting the exponent by +1 or +2; b. a 01.XX. .. X data path for mantissas greater than or equal to 1 but less than 2, said data path having means for right shifting the close enough bits and adjusting the exponents by +0 or +1; c. a 00.1X. .. X data path for mantissas greater than or equal to 1/2 but less than 1, said data path having means for left shifting bits and adjusting the exponent by -1 or +0; and d. a 00.01X. .. X data path left shifter for mantissas less than 1/2, said data path having means for left shifting the bits and adjusting the exponent by the shift amount; whereby each of said data paths produces a normalized and rounded mantissa for its subset of mantissas.