major stock markets of the world

8/12/2019 Major Stock Markets of the World

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Worlds Major Stock Markets


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History of Worlds Stock

Exchanges Oldest Stock Exchange in the world is the Amsterdam

Stock Exchange (1602) and was later followed by theParis Stock Exchange (1724) and the Philadelphia

Stock Exchange (1790) The London Stock Exchange was formed in 1801

although it is argued that it existed informally since1698

The Milan Stock Exchange was formed in 1808 andthe New York Stock Exchange in 1817

Coming to India, the Bombay Stock Exchange startedin 1875 and the National Stock Exchange in 1992


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Introduction The World Federation of Exchanges (WFE) ranks the stock

exchanges of the world. It is the trade association of 58 publicly regulated stock, futures and

options exchanges. It sorts all the exchanges by size so as to identify the largest stock

exchanges in terms of various factors like market capitalization,number of listed companies, total volume of shares, etc.

To be a member, exchanges must adhere to the WFE MembershipCriteria. Candidates are selected following a peer review. There are2 Associates, 17 WFE Affiliates with separate professional relationsand 31 exchanges which are WFE Correspondents.

In 2012, the global market capitalization recovered with a 15.1%growth rate to USD 55 trillion. This growth rate was nevertheless

not sufficient to reach again the levels observed during the firstmonths of 2011. The best performance in 2012 was observed in the Americas

(+17.2%) followed by Asia-Pacific (+15.4%) and EAME (+11.6%). In the Americas, the growth was mainly driven by the US

exchanges that increased 19% while Canada increased slightly less

(8%) and contrasted trends were observed in Latin Americancountries.


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Introduction In Asia-Pacific, the highest growth rates were observed in Thailand(+45%), Philippines (+39%), Singapore (+28%), Hong Kong (+25%)

and India (+25%) and relatively lower growth rates occurred in China(+8% ) and Japan (+5%).

In EAME, Africa and Middle East region experienced a 20% growthrate while the Euro zone increased 14% and the LSEG in the UK rose

4%. In 2012, the total number of listed companies on WFE exchanges was

steady (-0.3%) : -0.4% in Americas, +0.9% in Asia-Pacific and -2.2% inEAME.

Despite the good performance of market capitalization in 2012, theElectronic Order Book (EOB) turnover value declined by 22.5%. All

the regions were affected by this trading volumes drop : EAME (-24.1%), Americas (- 23.2%) and Asia Pacific (-20%). The global number of trades also decreased significantly in 2012, but

in Asia Pacific and EAME, the decrease was less pronounced than forthe value of share trading.

In 2012, the average transaction size (weighted by value of share

trading) slightly increased from USD 8100 to 8300.


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NASDAQ Actually called as NASDAQ OMX as managed by the OMX Group of US

As of January, 2012, there are 2,784 listings with a market capitalization ofUSD 4.45 trillion

NASDAQ has a pre-market session from 7:00am to 9:30am, a normaltrading session from 9:30am to 4:00pm and a post-market session from4:00pm to 8:00pm

NASDAQ quotes are available at three levels:-

Level 1 shows the highest bid and lowest offer (the inside quotes)

Level 2 shows all public quotes of market makers together withinformation of market dealers wishing to sell or buy stock and recently

executed orders Level 3 is used by the market makers and allows them to enter their

quotes and execute orders

Developed in 1971 as the first electronic stock exchange in the world, it iseven today the largest electronic screen-based equity securities trading

market in the United States and second-largest by market capitalizationin the world


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NASDAQ Created basically to increase trading of OTC stocks those were unable to

meet listing requirements for larger exchanges. A record 2500 stocks were traded on the first trading day (ie) 8thFebruary,

1971. In 1990, NASDAQ began to be seen as a competitor to NYSE and in 1994

actually beat it in annual shares traded. In 1998, NASDAQ merged with the American Stock Exchange (which

mostly traded derivatives) creating the NASDAQ-AMEX Market Group. The combined company still operates as two separate exchanges but is able

to compete with NYSE.

In 2013, NASDAQ was approached by PE Firm Carlyle Group about takingthe exchange operator private, but the talks fell apart over a disagreementon price.

The NASDAQ Composite (started on 5thFebruary, 1971 with a base level of100 points) is the benchmark index of NASDAQ which is the stock marketindex of the common stocks and similar securities listed on the NASDAQstock market, meaning that it has over 3,000 components.

It is highly followed in the U.S. as an indicator of the performance of stocksof technology companies and growth companies. Since both US and non-US companies are listed on the NASDAQ stock market, the index is notexclusively a US index.


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The origin of the NYSE can be traced to May 17, 1792, when the Buttonwood Agreement

was signed by 24 New York City stock brokers and merchants outside of 68 Wall Streetin New York under a buttonwood tree on Wall Street.

On March 8, 1817, the organization drafted a constitution and renamed itself the "NewYork Stock & Exchange Board."

NYSE Euronext, Inc. (formerly NYSE Group, Inc. and Euronext N.V.) is an Euro-American for-profit corporation and is currently located at 11 Wall Street, Lower

Manhattan, New York City, USA. Merger completed on April 4, 2007

Duncan Niederauer (CEO) and Jan-Michiel Hessels (Chairman) are the key people forNYSE Euronext.

It is the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its 2308 listedcompanies at USD 14.24 trillion as of December, 2011.

Average daily trading value was approximately USD 153 billion in 2008 and the volumefor November 2010 was USD 1439 billion.

The NYSE is open for trading from Monday to Friday between 9:30 am to 4:00 pm withthe exception of holidays declared by the Exchange in advance.

On February 15, 2011 NYSE and Deutsche Brse announced their merger to form a newcompany, wherein Deutsche Brse shareholders will have 60% ownership of the newentity, and NYSE-Euronext shareholders will have 40%.

NYSE EuroNext


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NYSE EuroNext On February 1, 2012, the European Commission blocked the merger of NYSE with

Deutsche Brse, stating that the merger "would have led to a near-monopoly inEuropean financial derivatives worldwide". Instead, Deutsche Brse and NYSE will

have to sell either their Eurex derivatives or LIFFE shares in order to not createa monopoly.

On February 2, 2012, NYSE Euronext and Deutsche Brse agreed with strongopposition by the EU for the planned merger, to scrap the merger.

The S&P 500 is the benchmark index of this exchange which is a free-floatcapitalization-weighted index (published since March 4, 1957 with a base level of100 points) of the prices of 500 large-cap common stocks actively traded in the

United States. The stocks included in the S&P 500 are those of large publicly held companies that

trade on either of the two largest American stock market exchanges - the NYSEand the NASDAQ.

The index focus is on US based companies although there are a few companieswith headquarters in and/or incorporated in other countries.

After the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the S&P 500 is the most widely followedindex of large-cap American stocks.

The index is the best known of the many indices owned and maintained byStandard & Poor's, a division of McGraw-Hill.

The components of the S&P 500 are selected by a committee so that they arerepresentative of all the industries in the United States economy.

The index does include a handful (11 as of July 5, 2011) of non-U.S. companies. This

group includes both formerly U.S. companies that have reincorporated outside theUnited States, as well as firms that have never been incorporated in the US.


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Dow Jones Industrial Average The Dow Jones Industrial Average, also referred to as the Industrial Average,

the Dow Jones, the Dow 30 or simply the Dow, is a stock market index and one of

several indices created by Wall Street Journal editor and Dow Jones & Companyco-founder Charles Dow.

It is now owned by the CME Group which is the majority owner of Dow JonesIndexes. The average is named after Dow and one of his business associates,statistician Edward Jones.

It is an index that shows how 30 large and publicly owned companies based in theUnited States have traded during a standard trading session in the stock market.

It is the second oldest U.S. market index after the Dow Jones TransportationAverage which was also created by Dow.

Along with the NASDAQ Composite and the S&P 500 Index, the Dow is among themost closely watched US benchmark indices tracking targeted stock marketactivity.

Components of the Dow trade on both the NASDAQ OMX and the NYSEEuronext, two of the largest stock market exchanges.

Although Dow compiled the index to gauge the performance of the industrialsector within the American economy, the index's performance continues to beinfluenced by not only corporate and economic reports but also by domestic andforeign political events such as war and terrorism as well as by natural disastersthat could potentially lead to economic harm.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was founded by Charles Dow on May 26, 1896and when it was first published in the late 1890s, the index stood at a level of 40.94

points.


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Toronto Stock Exchange On October 25, 1861, 24 men gathered at the Masonic Hall to officially createthe Toronto Stock Exchange. The exchange was formally incorporated by an

act of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario in 1878.

Toronto Stock Exchange (now TSX & formerly TSE) is the largest stockexchange in Canada, the third largest in North America and the seventhlargest in the world by market capitalization.

Based in Canada's largest city, Toronto, it is owned by and operated as asubsidiary of the TMX Group for the trading of senior equities. Tom Kloet(CEO) & Wayne Fox (Chairman) are the key people for TSX.

A broad range of businesses from Canada, the United States, Europe and othercountries are represented on the exchange. The Toronto Stock Exchange is theleader in the mining and oil & gas sector as more mining and oil & gas

companies are listed on Toronto Stock Exchange than any other exchange inthe world.

As on January, 2012, the market capitalization of TSX was USD 10.92 trillionwith 1498 listings.

On April 23, 1997, the TSX's trading floor closed, making it the second-largeststock exchange in North America to choose a floorless, electronic (or virtual

trading) environment.


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Toronto Stock Exchange In 2000, the Toronto Stock Exchange became a for-profit company and in 2001

its acronym was changed to TSX from TSE.

On February 9, 2011, the London Stock Exchange announced that they hadagreed to merge with the TMX Group, Toronto Stock Exchange's parent,hoping to create a combined entity with a market capitalization of USD 5.9trillion ( 3.7 trillion).

Based on data from December 30, 2010, the new stock exchange would havebeen the second largest in the world with a market cap 48% greater than theNASDAQ.

On June 29, 2011, about two weeks after the Maple Group (composed of theleading banks and financial institutions of Canada) launched a competing bid(cash and stock deal of CAD 3.7 billion on June 13, 2011), the LSEG-TMX dealwas terminated after failing to receive the minimum 67% voter approval fromshareholders of TMX Group.

The exchange has a normal trading session from 09:30 am to 04:00 pm and a

post-market session from 04:15 pm to 05:00 pm on all days of the week exceptSaturdays, Sundays and holidays declared by the Exchange in advance.

The S&P/TSX Composite Index is the benchmark index of the stock (equity)prices of the largest companies on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) asmeasured by market capitalization.

The Toronto Stock Exchange listed companies in this index comprise about70% of market capitalization for all Canadian-based companies listed on the

TSX. It replaces the earlier TSE 300 Index.


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London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange Group PLC is a company founded in 1801 and registered in

England and Wales under number 05369106, whose registered office is 10 Paternoster

Square, London EC4M 7LS The London Stock Exchange is at the heart of the global financial market and is home to

some of the largest, most successful and dynamic companies in the world.

The Exchange has built on a long history of integrity, expertise and market knowledgeto become the world's most international stock exchange. In October 2007, theExchange merged with Borsa Italiana, creating Europe's leading diversified exchange

business, the London Stock Exchange Group. The Exchange is the most international of all the worlds stock exchanges, witharound

3,000 companies from over 70 countries admitted to trading on its markets and as ofDecember 2011, the Exchange had 2864 listings and a market capitalization of USD 3.27trillion, making it the fourth-largest stock exchange in the world by this measurementand the largest in Europe.

From conducting its business in the coffee houses of 17th century London, the Exchangeis one of the worlds oldest stock exchanges and can trace its history back to more than300 years.

Live financial broadcasts are transmitted throughout the day from the Exchange's ownTV studios.

Over 400 firms, mainly investment banks and stockbrokers, are members of the London

Stock Exchange.


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London Stock Exchange On 9th February 2011, the London Stock Exchange Group announced that they had

agreed to merge with the Toronto-based TMX Group, the owners of the Toronto StockExchange.

The London Stock Exchange however announced it was terminating the merger withTMX on 29th June, 2011, citing that "LSEG and TMX Group believe that the merger ishighly unlikely to achieve the required two-thirds majority approval at the TMX Groupshareholder meeting as even though the LSE obtained the necessary support from itsshareholders, it failed to obtain the required support from TMX's shareholders.

The LSE's current trading platform is Linux-based own edition named "MilleniumExchange.

The London Stock Exchange has four core areas - Equity Markets, Trading Services,Information Services & Derivatives.

Normal trading sessions are from 08:00 to 16:30 every day of the week except Saturdays,Sundays and holidays declared by the Exchange in advance.

The FTSE 100 Index, also called FTSE 100, FTSEor informally, the Footsie is a shareindex of the 100 most highly capitalized UK companies listed on the London StockExchange.

The index is maintained by the FTSE Group, an independent company jointly owned byThe Financial Times and the London Stock Exchange. Its name derives from theacronym of its two parent companies but has since been registered as a limitedcompany in its own right.

The index began on January 3, 1984 with a base level of 1000 points and is calculated onreal time basis and published every 15 seconds.

FTSE 100 companies represent about 81% of the market capitalization of the whole

London Stock Exchange.


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Frankfurt Stock Exchange Founded in 1585 and located in Frankfurt am Main, Germany

The Frankfurt Stock Exchange (Frankfurter Wertpapierbrse in German)isone of the largest stock exchanges in the world which is owned andoperated by Deutsche Brse, which also owns the European futuresexchange Eurex and the clearing company Clearstream.

The Frankfurt Stock Exchange accounts for over 90% of the turnover inthe German market and a very large share of the European market.

In 2010, the Frankfurt Stock Exchange agreed to move to abolish floortrading and completed this transition in May 2011.

Today, trading takes place exclusively via the Xetra system, withredundant floor brokers taking on the role of market-makers on the newplatform.

More than 14 international exchanges have adopted Xetra (including the

Vienna Stock Exchange in 1999, the Irish Stock Exchange in 2000 and theBudapest Stock Exchange in 2003). Approximately 47% of the 300 marketparticipants in Frankfurt come from abroad.

As of December, 2010, companies from more than 80 countries list on theFrankfurt Stock Exchange with 49% from North and South America. 31%from Europe (including Russia), 14% from Asia and 6% from Australia and

Africa.


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Frankfurt Stock Exchange The Frankfurt Stock Exchange is the world's 12th largest stock exchange

by market capitalization and which was USD 1.3 trillion as on January,

2012. The Frankfurt Stock Exchange has more than 250 international trading

institutions and more than 4,500 traders. Investors directly connected tothe Frankfurt Stock Exchange represent 35% of the world's investmentcapital.

In 2002 and 2004 Deutsche Brse was in advanced negotiations to take

over London Stock Exchange but which were broken off in 2005. Automatic Xetra trading runs from 09:00 to 17:30 with closing auction

from 17:30-17:35 and floor brokers' trading times are from 8:00 to 20:00.

The DAX (Deutscher Aktien IndeX) is the benchmark index of theFrankfurt Stock Exchange which is a blue chip stock market indexconsisting of the 30 major German companies trading on the exchange.

Prices are taken from the electronic Xetra trading system. According toDeutsche Brse, the operator of Xetra, DAX measures the performance ofthe 30 largest German companies in terms of order book volume andmarket capitalization.

The Base date for the DAX is 30 December, 1987 and it was started from abase value of 1,000. The Xetra system calculates the index after every 1second since January 1, 2006.


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Paris Stock Exchange Euronext Paris is France's securities market, formerly known as the Paris

Bourse, which merged with the Amsterdam, Lisbon and Brusselsexchanges in September 2000 to form Euronext NV, which is the secondlargest exchange in Europe behind the UK's London Stock Exchange. Itnow belongs to the NYSE Euronext group, the first global stock exchange.

Until the late 1980s, this market operated as an open outcry exchange,with the agents de change meeting on the exchange floor of the PalaisBrongniart.

In 1986, the Paris Bourse started to implement an electronic trading

system. This was known generically as CATS (Computer Assisted TradingSystem), but the Paris version was called CAC (Cotation Assiste enContinu).

By 1989, quotations were fully automated. The Palais Brongniart hostedthe French financial derivatives exchanges MATIF and MONEP, until they

were fully automated in 1998. In the late 1990s, the Paris Bourse launched

the Euronext initiative, an alliance of several European stock exchanges. All products are traded electronically on the NSC (Nouveau Systme de

Cotation) trading system adopted by all of the Euronext members. Cashsettlement is on a trading cycle of T+3 with trading hours from 9 am to5:30 pm from Monday to Friday.

As on February 28, 2007, Euronext Paris has a USD 2.9 trillion totalmarket capitalization of listed companies and average daily trading valueof its combined markets of approximately $102 billion or 77 billion.


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Paris Stock Exchange The CAC 40 is the benchmark French stock market index. The

index represents a capitalization-weighted measure of the 40most significant values among the 100 highest market caps onthe Paris Bourse (now Euronext Paris).

It is one of the main national indices of the pan-European stockexchange group Euronext alongside Brussels' BEL20, Lisbon'sPSI-20 and Amsterdam's AEX.

The CAC 40 takes its name from the Paris Bourse's earlyautomation system Cotation Assiste en Continu (Continuous

Assisted Quotation). Its base value of 1,000 was set on 31st December, 1987.

In December 2003, the index's weighting system switched frombeing dependent on total market capitalization to free float

market cap only, in line with other leading indices.


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Tokyo Stock Exchange The Tokyo Stock Exchange or TSE for short, is located in Tokyo, Japan and is

the third largest stock exchange in the world by aggregate market

capitalization of its listed companies. Taizo Nishimuro (Chairman), Atsushi Saito (President & CEO) and Yasuo

Tobiyama (MD, COO & CFO) are the key people for TSE.

The Tokyo Stock Exchange had 2292 listed companies with a combinedmarket capitalization of USD 3.3 trillion as of December, 2011 with itsoperating hours from 9:00 to 11:30 am and from 12:30 to 3:00 pm.

The LSE and the TSE are developing jointly traded products and sharetechnology, marking the latest cross-border deal among bourses asinternational competition heats up.

The TSE is also looking for some partners in Asia, and more specifically isseeking an alliance with the SGX, which is considered as becoming a leadingfinancial hub in the Asia-Pacific region. On 15 June 2007, the TSE had paid

$303 million to acquire a 4.99% stake in Singapore Exchange Ltd. Stocks listed on the TSE are separated into the First Section for large

companies, the Second Section for mid-sized companies and the Mothers(Market of the high-growth and emerging stocks) section for high-growthstartup companies.

As of October 31, 2010, there were 1,675 First Section companies, 437 Second

Section companies and 182 Mothers companies.


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Tokyo Stock Exchange The main indices tracking the TSE are the Nikkei 225 index of companies selected

by the Nihon Keizai Shimbun (Japan's largest business newspaper) and the TOPIX(Tokyo Stock Price Index) index based on the share prices of First Sectioncompanies.

The Nikkei 225 began to be calculated daily from September 7, 1950 and sinceJanuary 2010, the index is updated every 15 seconds during trading sessions.

Currently, the Nikkei is the most widely quoted average of Japanese equities,similar to the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

The Nikkei hit its all-time high on December 29, 1989, when it reached an intra-day high of 38,957.44 before closing at 38,915.87, having grown six-fold during the

decade. Since then, it has lost nearly all these gains, closing at 7,054.98 on March10, 200981.9% below its peak twenty years earlier.

On March 15, 2011, the second working day after the massive earthquake in thenortheast part of Japan, the index dropped over 10% to finish at 8605.15, a loss of1,015 points.

The TOPIX is calculated and published by the TSE. As of February 1, 2011, there are1,669 companies listed on the First Section of the TSE and the market value for the

index was JPY 197.4 trillion. The index transitioned from a system where a company's weighting is based on the

total number of shares outstanding (commonly called the total float) to aweighting based on the number of shares available for trading (called the freefloat). This transition took place in three phases starting in October 2005 and wascompleted in June 2006.

TSE used to calculate and distribute TOPIX every second earlier but now has

launched a new High-Speed Index dissemination service provided at themillisecond level starting from February 28, 2011.


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Hong Kong Stock Exchange

The Hong Kong Stock Exchangeis a stock exchange located in HongKong. It is Asia's 3rd largest stock exchange in terms of marketcapitalization behind the Tokyo Stock Exchange and the Shanghai StockExchange and sixth largest in the world.

As of November 30, 2011, the Hong Kong Stock Exchange had 1477 listedcompanies with a combined market capitalization of HK$ 16.99 trillion.Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing is the holding company for the

exchange. The history of the securities exchange began formally in the late 19th

century with the first establishment in 1891, though informal securitiesexchanges have been known to take place since 1861.

Starting from 7th March, 2011, the HKEX has extended its trading hours.In the first stage, it was 09.30-12.00 and 13.30-16.00. In the second stage,

from 5th March, 2012, the afternoon trade has changed to 13.00-16.00. The exchange first introduced a computer-assisted trading system on 2nd

April 1986. In 1993, the exchange launched the "Automatic OrderMatching and Execution System" (AMS), which was replaced by the thirdgeneration system (AMS/3) in October 2000.

The benchmark index of HKEX is the Hang Seng Index whichis a freefloat adjusted market capitalization-weighted stock market index.


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Hong Kong Stock Exchange It is used to record and monitor daily changes of the largest companies of the Hong

Kong stock market and is the main indicator of the overall market performance in Hong

Kong. These 48 constituent companies represent about 60% of capitalization of theHong Kong Stock Exchange.

HSI was created by Hong Kong banker Stanley Kwan and was started on November 24,1969 with a base level of 100 points and is currently compiled and maintained by HangSeng Indexes Company Limited, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hang Seng Bank,one of the largest banks registered and listed in Hong Kong in terms of marketcapitalization. Hang Seng Bank, despite being a public company, is held in majority byHSBC.

It is responsible for compiling, publishing and managing the Hang Seng Index and arange of other stock indices in Hong Kong.

Its all-time low is 58.61 points set on August 31, 1967, after the base value wasestablished but before the publication of the index. Its all-time high, set on October 30,2007, was 31,958.41 points during trading hours. On October 8, 2008, the index closed at15,431.73 over 50% less than the all-time high and the lowest closing value in over twoyears. On October 27, 2008, the index further fell to 10,676.29 points, having fallen

nearly two-thirds from its all-time peak, but passed the 20,000 point milestone again to20,063.93 on 24 July 2009. As of July 30, 2012, the index is hovering around 19,000 to20,000 points.

On January 2, 1985, four sub-indices were established in order to make the index clearerand to classify constituent stocks into four distinct sectors namely Hang Seng FinanceSub-index, Hang Seng Utilities Sub-index, Hang Seng Properties Sub-index and HangSeng Commerce & Industry Sub-index.

In the future, the number of constituent stocks will be increased to 50 in order to reflect

the changes in the Hong Kong stock market and to maintain the index as the mostrepresentative market benchmark.


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Madrid Stock Exchange Founded in 1831, Bolsa de Madrid(Madrid Stock Exchange) is the largest and

most international of Spain's four regional stock exchanges (the others are located

in Barcelona, Valencia and Bilbao) that trade shares and convertible bonds andfixed income securities, and both government and private-sector debt.

Bolsa de Madrid is owned by Bolsas y Mercados Espaoles.

Trading is linked through the electronic Spanish Stock Market InterconnectionSystem (SIBE), which handles more than 90% of transactions.

Trading on SIBE is conducted from 9.00 am to 5.30 pm & open outcry from 10.00am to 11.30 am, both from Monday to Friday with a trading cycle of T+3.

The membership of the Madrid Stock Exchange consists of 41 major financialinstitutions and 12 established securities dealers.

At December 31, 2001, approximately 1477 domestic and foreign companies hadtheir equity securities listed on the Madrid Stock Exchange. The total marketcapitalization of the equity securities listed on the Madrid Stock Exchange on May,2007 was EUR 1.2 trillion.

The Madrid Stock Exchange General Index (IGBM) is the exchange's principleindex and represents the construction, financial services, communications,consumer, capital/intermediate goods, energy and market services sectors.

This index was developed with a base value of 100 points as of December 31, 1985.

The IBEX 35 Index is a capitalization-weighted index comprising the 35 most liquidSpanish stocks traded in the continuous market and is Bolsa de Madrid'sbenchmark. Bolsa de Madrid also offers the FTSE-Latibex Index, a Europeanmarket for Latin American stocks. The IBEX New Market Index, for emergingcompanies, was offered from 2000 to 2007.


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SIX Swiss Exchange SIX Swiss Exchange(formerly SWX Swiss Exchange), based in Zurich, is Switzerland's

principal stock exchange (the other being Berne Exchange).

SIX Swiss Exchange also trades other securities such as Swiss government bonds andderivatives such as stock options.

It was the first stock exchange in the world to incorporate a fully automated trading,clearing and settlement system in 1995. The exchange is controlled by an association of55 banks. Each of these banks have equal voting rights in the matter of decision makingconcerning the management and regulation of the exchange.

It is the joint owner of Eurex, the world's largest futures and derivatives exchange alongwith their German partners Deutsche Brse. In July 2004, however, SIX Swiss Exchange

rejected a merger proposal from the German company, that analysts anticipated asprofitable for many small companies listed on SIX Swiss Exchange.

The exchange's normal trading sessions are from 9.00 am to 5.30 pm on all days of theweek except Saturdays, Sundays and holidays declared by the Exchange in advance.

The main stock market index for the SIX Swiss Exchange is the SMI, the Swiss MarketIndex. The index consists of the 20 most significant equity-securities based on the freefloat market capitalization.

The SMI was introduced on 30 June, 1988 at a base value of 1500 points. Its compositionis examined once a year. Calculation takes place in real-time, as soon as a newtransaction occurs in a security contained in the SMI, an updated index level iscalculated and displayed.

The securities contained in the SMI currently represent more than 90% of the entiremarket capitalization as well as of 90% trading volume of all the equities listed on theSIX Swiss Exchange. Because the SMI is considered to be a mirror of the overall Swissstock market, it is used as the underlying index for numerous derivative financialinstruments such as options, futures and index funds.


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The MSCI EAFE (Europe, Australasia and Far East) Index is a stockmarket index that is designed to measure the equity marketperformance of 21 developed markets outside the US & Canada. It ismaintained by MSCI Barra, a provider of investment decision supporttools.

The index is market-capitalization weighted and it first ranks eachstock in the investable universe from largest to smallest by marketcapitalization. The largest 70% will comprise the MSCI EAFE LargeCap (new index), the largest 85% will comprise the MSCI EAFEStandard and the largest 99% will comprise the MSCI InvestableMarket Index (IMI).

The 71st to 85th percentiles represent the MSCI EAFE Mid Cap and the85th to 99th percentiles represent the MSCI EAFE Small Cap.

The index has been calculated since December 31, 1969, making it theoldest truly international stock index. It is probably the most commonbenchmark for foreign stocks.

major stock markets of the world

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