By providing a centralized, ready market for the exchange of securities, stock exchanges greatly facilitate the financing of business through flotation of stocks and bonds. However, speculation in stocks can sometimes accentuate the instability of an economy. The reality of the Great Depression was emphasized by the stock market crash in 1929. The interstate sale of securities and certain stock exchange practices in the United States are regulated by federal laws administered by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Today, a large percentage of stocks are traded through such over-the-counter organizations as Nasdaq (National Association of Securities Dealers Automatic Quotations) and its European equivalent, Nasdaq Europe (formerly Easdaq). Through these organizations, many securities not listed on a major stock exchange may be traded by dealers using computer and telecommunications technology; in 1994, Nasdaq, on which many computer and other high-technology stocks are traded, surpassed the NYSE in annual share volume. After the deregulation of the British securities market in 1986, the London Stock Exchange saw a decline in business due to a new computerized market similar to Nasdaq.

Computer-driven trade has significantly affected the stock exchange. Computer and telecommunications technology, besides opening a wide market in over the counter dealings, has also given rise to trading on an international level. Personal computers and modems allow trading to occur around the clock (after-hours NYSE and Nasdaq trading began in 1999), and the securities trading on one major stock exchange can now significantly affect the trading on others. Many contend that the traditional manner of trading will eventually become obsolete. Technology also now allows for "day trading," a high-risk business in which numerous computerized trades are made during a single day, with large gains (and large losses) possible. See also margin requirement.

Responsibilities

The SEC administers a number of the most important reform measures of the New Deal: the Securities Act of 1933, the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935, the Trust Indenture Act of 1939, the Investment Company Act of 1940, and the Investment Advisers Act of 1940. In addition it may act as a participant in corporate reorganizations in the federal courts under the National Bankruptcy Act.

The first three of these statutes were passed in response to the pressure for greater protection of investors that developed as a result of the drastic decline in values of securities after Oct., 1929, the revelation of fraudulent and unfair practices in the sale of stocks and bonds, and the widespread belief that such practices had contributed to the severity of the Great Depression of the 1930s.

The Securities Act of 1933 is intended to compel full disclosure to investors of material facts about securities offered and sold in interstate commerce or through the mails. It requires that before an issue of securities may be offered for public sale the issuer must file with the SEC a registration statement giving complete information on such securities and on the issuing company. Dealers in securities must provide their customers with a condensation of the data in the statement. The SEC examines the statement and may refuse registration if it appears to be misleading, inaccurate, or incomplete. If registration is denied, the securities may not be offered for sale. However, an approval of the statement is not a finding by the SEC that the securities have investment value, or even a guarantee that the disclosures are accurate.

The Securities Exchange Act of 1934 is designed to increase the information available to investors and to prevent unfair practices in U.S. stock exchanges. It requires that certain current information be made public on the financial and managerial condition of corporations whose securities are traded in the exchanges. A registration statement containing such data for each listed security must be submitted to the SEC. The act also places the stock exchanges and over-the-counter markets under the SEC's supervision. Stock exchanges, brokers, and dealers must file information about themselves with the commission. Manipulative practices and false and misleading statements are prohibited. Other practices, such as short sales and market pegging, are regulated. Officers, directors, and principal stockholders of corporations whose securities are registered must report all their transactions in equity securities of their companies. The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System is responsible for regulating by means of margin requirements the use of bank credit to finance trading in securities.

The Public Utility Holding Company Act regulates the financial practices of holding-company systems controlling electric and gas utilities. It provides for registration of holding companies, elimination of uneconomic holding-company structures, and supervision of their transactions in securities and of certain of their financial practices. The SEC must pass upon all plans for reorganization of such companies or their subsidiaries and must require the corporate simplification and geographic integration of holding-company systems. However, it does not regulate public-utility rates. This act was upheld by the Supreme Court in 1946.

The Trust Indenture Act requires that securities of trustees meet satisfactory standards, and it also sets up qualifications for trustees. The Investment Company and Investment Advisers acts provide for registration and regulation of investment trusts, investment companies, and investment advisers.

The various laws administered by the SEC are intended to give investors a greater degree of safety in entrusting their money to enterprises than was previously afforded them. With these laws the emphasis in determining responsibility for the quality and condition of goods sold has shifted from the buyer to the seller. However, the statutes do not guarantee investors against loss. It is perhaps no more difficult for them to lose their money than before. The regulatory measures were at first bitterly opposed by the financial community, on the ground that they imposed such severe limitations and liabilities on security issuers and dealers as to impede the financing of industry. Persons aggrieved by the decisions of the SEC have a right of review by a U.S. circuit court of appeals. The original penalties of the Securities Act of 1933 were softened in 1934. Governmental supervision has won generally increasing acceptance by the interests concerned.

Organized market for the sale and purchase of securities (see security) such as stocks and bonds. Trading is done in various ways: it may occur on a continuous auction basis, it may involve brokers buying from and selling to dealers in certain types of stock, or it may be conducted through specialists in a particular stock. Some stock exchanges, such as the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), sell seats (the right to trade) to a limited number of members who must meet eligibility requirements. Stocks must likewise meet and maintain certain requirements or risk being delisted. Stock exchanges differ from country to country in eligibility requirements and in the degree to which the government participates in their management. The London Stock Exchange, for example, is an independent institution, free from government regulation. In Europe, members of the exchanges are often appointed by government officials and have semigovernmental status. In the U.S., stock exchanges are not directly run by the government but are regulated by law. Technological developments have greatly influenced the nature of trading. In a traditional full-service brokerage, a customer placed an order with a broker or member of a stock exchange, who in turn passed it on to a specialist on the floor of the exchange, who then concluded the transaction. By the 21st century, increased access to the Internet and the proliferation of electronic communications networks (ECNs) altered the investment world. Through e-trading, the customer enters an order directly on-line, and software automatically matches orders to achieve the best price available without the intervention of specialists or market makers. In effect, the ECN is a stock exchange for off-the-floor trading.

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Any of a wide variety of synthetic polymers containing positively or negatively charged sites that can interact with or bind to an ion of opposite charge from a surrounding solution. Light, porous solids in granules, beads, or sheets, they absorb the solution and swell as they attract the target ions; when exhausted, they are removed from use and regenerated by an inexpensive brine or carbonate solution. A solid support of styrene-divinylbenzene copolymer to which are attached sulfonic or carboxylic acid groups is often used to attract and exchange cations (e.g., ions of hydrogen or metals). Quaternary ammonium groups on the solid matrix are used to attract anions (e.g., ions of chlorine). Industrially, the resins are used to soften hard water, purify sugar, and concentrate valuable elements (gold, silver, uranium) from their ores. In the laboratory they are used to separate and concentrate substances and sometimes as catalysts. Zeolites are minerals with ion-exchange properties.

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Transfer of goods or services that, although regarded as voluntary by those involved, is part of expected social behaviour. First studied by Marcel Mauss, the gift-exchange cycle entails obligations to give, receive, and return, each phase being surrounded with sanctions and calculations involving prestige and the maintenance of social relations. Some sacrifices may be viewed as gifts to supernatural powers from which a return in the form of aid or approval is expected; and the transfer of women in marriage between kin groups usually involves social obligations similar to those found in gift exchange. Seealso potlatch.

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Organized market for the purchase and sale of enforceable contracts to deliver a commodity (such as wheat, gold, or cotton) or a financial instrument (such as U.S. treasury bills) at some future date. Such contracts are known as futures and are bought and sold in a competitive auction process on commodity exchanges (also called futures markets). The largest futures and futures-options exchange is the Chicago Board of Trade.

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Price of one country's money in relation to another's. Exchange rates may be fixed or flexible. An exchange rate is fixed when two countries agree to maintain a fixed rate through the use of monetary policy. Historically, the most famous fixed exchange-rate system was the gold standard; in the late 1850s, one ounce of gold was defined as being worth 20 U.S dollars and 4 pounds sterling, resulting in an exchange rate of 5 dollars per pound. An exchange rate is flexible, or “floating,” when two countries agree to let international market forces determine the rate through supply and demand. The rate will fluctuate with a country's exports and imports. Most world trade currently takes place with flexible exchange rates that fluctuate within relatively fixed limits. Seealso exchange control, foreign exchange.

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Governmental restrictions on private transactions in foreign money or claims on foreign money. Residents are required to sell foreign money coming into their possession to a central bank or specialized government agency at exchange rates set by the government. The chief function of most systems of exchange control is to maintain a favourable balance of payments. Seealso foreign exchange.

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Direct exchange of goods or services without the use of money or any other intervening medium of exchange. Barter is conducted either according to established rates of exchange or by bargaining. Barter is common among preliterate societies, particularly in those communities with some developed form of market. Goods may be bartered within a group as well as between groups, although gift exchange probably accounts for most intragroup trade, particularly in small and relatively simple societies. Seealso currency.

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Short-term negotiable financial instrument consisting of a written order addressed by the seller of goods to the buyer requiring the latter to pay a certain sum of money on demand or at a future time. Bills of exchange are often used in international transactions, and the holder of such a bill may redeem it in cash immediately by selling it to a bank at a discount. Bills of exchange used in domestic transactions are sometimes called drafts. Seealso promissory note.

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U.S. regulatory commission established by Congress in 1934. Its purpose was to restore investor confidence by ending the misleading sales practices and stock manipulations that had led to the stock market's 1929 collapse (see Stock Market Crash of 1929). It also prohibited the purchase of stock shares without adequate funds to pay for them, initiated registration and supervision of securities markets and stockbrokers, established rules regarding proxies, and prohibited unfair use of nonpublic information in stock trading (see insider trading). It also required that companies offering securities make full public disclosure of all relevant information. The discovery of fraudulent accounting practices among several large U.S. corporations brought demands for greater SEC oversight in the early 21st century.

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