London stock exchange

The London Stock Exchange, also known as LSE, is among the biggest stock exchanges in the world. It is the primary stock exchange in the U.K and the largest in Europe. Based in London, it was founded in 1773. It was later merged with the stock exchanges of Great Britain and Ireland and renamed the London Stock Exchange.

LSE is broken down into the Main Market and Alternative Investments Market or AIM. The independent FTSE Group maintains a series of indices for measuring the LSE, including the FTSE 100 Index, FTSE 250 Index and the FTSE 350 Index. FTSE is popularly referred to as the ‘Footsie’ globally. Today, the London Stock Exchange has become a big place where companies from across the world try to enlist their scripts, apart from companies that are based in the UK.

In fact, LSE is the most international of all the stock exchanges, with 350 companies from more than 50 countries listed here. It is also the premier source of equity-market liquidity, benchmark prices and market data in Europe. LSE has partnerships with other international exchanges that are based in Asia and Africa.

In 1986, LSE created history by becoming the first center where trading moved out of the traditional floor and on to the telephone. It was done by using a screen-based electronic bulletin board known as SEAQ (Stock Exchange Automated Quotations system). Then in the October of 1997, LSE completed its electronic revolution when it replaced the SEAQ system with SETS (Stock Exchange Electronic Trading) - for the top 100 shares. However SETS has become volatile, especially at the beginning and at the end of trading, before and after the bulk of orders are carried out.

The exchange is currently considering ways to revise this system.

In July 2004 the London Stock Exchange moved from Threadneedle Street to Paternoster Square close to St Paul's Cathedral. Queen Elizabeth II officially opened it and she was accompanied by The Duke of Edinburgh.