About the Stock Market

The stock market has been around for many years but a lot of people don’t know the history about the stock market. The roots of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) can actually be traced back to the Trinity Church in East Manhattan about 200 years ago. It started as a dirt path in front of this church where people traded silver for papers that said they owned shares in cargo that was brought in everyday by ships.

The American Revolution spurred to buying and selling of bonds in order to fund the war. The government sold bonds and the first of the nation’s banks began to sell shares of their own companies to people in order to raise money. As a result, Wall Street became a major center for these transactions. Also, an agreement was signed that created the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in 1792. The men who signed this agreement agreed to sell shares or parts of companies between themselves and then charge people commissions to buy and sell for them. This sparked the true spirit of the stock market as we know it today.

When learning about the stock market it is important to note that the Industrial Revolution of the 1900’s brought along a boom in Wall Street. The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) was currently the only way to buy stocks and those that were not good enough to be traded on the NYSE were traded outside on the curb! This curb trading later became the American Stock Exchange (AMEX).

The Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) was created after the Great Depression in 1934 and a government agency that is responsible regulating the securities industry. The SEC decides what is legal, sets the standards for brokers and investors and prosecutes those who break the rules.

Currently the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) has billions of dollars exchanging hands every single day, with thousands of companies traded and millions of people affected every day. Eventually the NASDAQ joined the stock market along with many local and international stock exchanges.

For more information please review our stock market glossary where you will find stock market definitions as well as stock market trading terms that you should find useful when learning about the stock market.

Please read about Japanese Candlesticks which is a trading strategy used by some of the world’s most successful traders along with other forms of technical analysis . It is the fastest way for new investors to quickly and accurately read stock charts when trading stock. Once you are comfortable with the major candlestick signals, expand your expertise by learning the secondary Candlestick Patterns . Combine these with your favorite technical analysis indicators, such as the moving average , and you have the perfect trading arsenal for evaluating stocks, currencies, commodities, or Exchange Traded Funds .