London Stock Exchange, often called the LSE, is a stock exchange in the United Kingdom. Brokers on the exchange buy and sell shares of stock in corporations based in the United Kingdom and other countries. The LSE is one of the world’s oldest stock exchanges. It traces its roots to a group of brokers who began meeting at a London coffeehouse in 1760. The members named their organization the Stock Exchange in 1773 and began formal operations in 1802. The exchange is on Paternoster Square, near St. Paul’s Cathedral in London.
Investors can follow LSE stock prices using Financial Times Stock Exchange (FTSE, pronounced FOOT see) indexes. These indexes are numbers that represent overall gains and losses of stocks traded on the exchange. The FTSE 100 tracks the stock prices of the 100 largest companies that are based in the United Kingdom. Other FTSE indexes track different groups of stocks of corporations in the United Kingdom and throughout the world.
In 1986, the LSE introduced several major reforms, collectively known as the Big Bang. The Big Bang marked an increased emphasis on the exchange’s international activity and a shift toward the use of computer systems in trading. Despite this, in the 2000’s, the London Stock Exchange, like many other exchanges, struggled to compete with brokers trading stocks electronically on the Internet. Many exchanges began merging, hoping to reduce costs. In 2007, the London Stock Exchange merged with Borsa Italiana, an Italian exchange based in Milan.
See also Financial Times Stock Exchange Index .
