Us Stock Market - Good Option To Invest Money In Stocks
Both the NYSE (or New York Stock Exchange) and NASDAQ (or National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations system) are the exchanges that make up the US stock market, which has been known to fluctuate greatly over the years.
The New York Stock exchange is more than a hundred and fifty years old and has the largest volume of stocks traded in the world in dollar terms. In terms of volumes, the New York Stock Exchange comes second, losing out to the NASDAQ, another exchange in the US stock market. The market capitalization of the NYSE is the highest in the world and runs into trillions of dollars.
The US stock markets facilitate the buying and selling of stocks through numerous exchanges such as the AMEX, NASDAQ and NYSE. The trading mechanisms are now mainly electronic, with the NYSE also still having the manual trading floor. In order to directly trade on the floor, one needs to be a member or seat owner. These seats are subject to limit and thus are quite a sought after commodity. Compensation is required to buy a seat with the current market price hovering around $4 million.
An index of stocks reflects the general trend in the prices of stocks. Each major stock exchange has an index constructed from the prices of significant stocks that are quoted and traded in the exchange. The NASDAQ index, the Dow Jones index and the S&P index are the three most important indices in the US. These indices are further enlarged to include stocks of all major sectors in order to indicate sector wise trends.
If you want to find out past performance or get a current quote for a particular company's stock, you can take a look online at the stock exchange websites. The websites will list an abbreviated name for each, and these are called stock symbols.
The history of the US stock markets is equally informative and interesting. During its long history one of the most notable events is the 1929 crash, perhaps the most significant one of all times. The black Tuesday in 1929 is usually considered the worst day in the US stock market long history. The biggest quantum of sellings was concluded on a single day. The crash of 1929 burned more than $100 billion dollars in investor's assets. Nowadays - in today's dollar values - this would be worth several hundred times more.
Should you have some spare money which you wish to invest stocks, this is a good option. There are various ways available for people which may even not have the expertise to manage their investments in their own. These ways include mutual fund companies and invest stocks. Even if these organisations usually manage your investments professionally, they are not all the same. You should always start your own investigation before deciding to invest through one ore another.
An investor in common stocks can buy, sell or trade in stocks in the us stock market easily and conveniently. The stock market in the US comprises New York Stock Exchange and the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations system. Both offer electronic trading and have an index of stocks, to reflect the trends in movements of key stocks. The NASDAQ index, Dow Jones index and S&P index are the major ones, with further subdivided indices maintained to include performances of various sectors. The prices and other data of shares are given with stock symbols representing the companies. To invest stocks is ideal for making your spare money work.
Published June 23rd, 2007
