What is after-hours trading?

The NYSE is one of the few remaining stock exchanges where much active trading still happens in person on the trading floor.

Visualize the differences between the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq.

Find out how companies decide which stock exchange to list on

Tech companies often prefer to list on the tech-focused Nasdaq, whereas more traditional organizations opt for the New York Stock Exchange. Sometimes the choice is made partly based on the services an exchange offers a company.

The stock market, explained in 3 minutes

The stock market consists of a set of exchanges and other venues where shares of public companies are bought and sold. The Nasdaq and the New York Stock Exchange are two of the most well-known exchanges in the US, while major exchanges also operate around the world, including in Tokyo, Shanghai, London, and São Paulo.

The Nasdaq was founded in 1971, marking the debut of electronic trading

The Nasdaq stock exchange arguably invented electronic trading, making it a key part of fintech history. It's often used as a benchmark for how the tech industry is performing.

When the New York Stock Exchange was started in 1792, traders would meet both outside on the street and in coffee shops to do business.

What’s up with the new Texas Stock Exchange?

The two biggest stock exchanges in the U.S. are both based in New York—the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq. But a potential new “Texas Stock Exchange”—which would be based in, you guessed it, Texas—could change that. To find out more about the project, backed by enormous companies such as BlackRock and Citadel, watch this video.

Read about when Nasdaq partnered with the London Stock Exchange in 1992, and other key moments in Nasdaq history

The partnership became the first intercontinental linkage between capital markets, setting the stage for worldwide trading amid increasing globalization. Nasdaq separated from its parent company in 2006, becoming a fully independent licensed national securities exchange. A year later, it added the Scandinavian-based Exchange, OMX.

The Nasdaq is typically the world's second-largest stock exchange when measured by the total market value of the companies listed on the exchange.

Companies sometimes change which stock exchange they're listed on.

'The stock market' can be loosely defined as a set of exchanges and other places where shares of public companies are bought and sold.

The fees for keeping a company listed on the NYSE are typically higher than the Nasdaq's.

A history of stock exchanges, from Venitain merchants to modern day

While the idea of stock exchanges—markets where securities can be bought and sold—is mostly synonymous with Wall Street, the New York Stock Exchange, and other modern markets, places to buy and sell financial instruments have a long history....

As technology evolved, so did Wall Street

Before the telephone was invented in the mid 1800s, people had to trade stocks in person. But once office telephones and computers became commonplace, banks and other financial institutions didn't necessarily need to have their headquarters near exchanges like Wall Street's New York Stock Exchange.

Electronic trading transformed investing, ushering in a new era for retail investors in which average Americans could research stocks online and then use early platforms like StreetSmart and E-Trade to conduct their transactions

In the early 1990s, stock brokerages knew that online trading would be a great equalizer, creating opportunities for more individuals to buy and sell stocks.

Over-the-counter markets are used to bypass traditional exchanges while trading

Commodities are regularly traded via OTC markets so that buyers and sellers can bypass central exchanges and negotiate terms more directly. Before the advent of formal exchanges, most assets were traded OTC.

While day trading has risen in popularity in recent years, the SEC warns it is a speculative strategy that can cause big losses

A day trader is anyone who buys and sells a stock within the same trading day. They quickly move in and out of the market to try and profit. Some day traders are professionals, while others are retail investors.

The origin and history of stock exchanges

When were stocks first sold? Though debt was first sold in Venice in the 14th century, stocks proper began in the Netherlands. To fund its spice trade across the world in 1602, the Dutch East India Company sold stocks to individual investors, a novel approach to raising funds. It was the Dutch West India Company that founded New York—the site of some of the world’s greatest stock exchanges. Listen to a concise historical overview here.

The first US stock exchange dates back to the 1790s in Philadelphia

Only two years after that stock exchange in Philadelphia started, the largest stock exchange in the US to date was created: the New York Stock Exchange.

The Nasdaq Composite index includes all of the companies traded on the exchange

This 3,000+ company index stands in contrast to the Nasdaq 100, which only includes 100 of the most influential non-financial companies traded on the exchange. These are the two most commonly used indices for Nasdaq investments.

Insider trading is the practice of trading a company's securities based on material, nonpublic information.

Retail investors can get exposure to commodities via various financial vehicles

While retail investors likely won't go out and purchase a bushel of commodity wheat to trade, they can get exposure to the commodities market via commodity ETFs sold on traditional stock exchanges like the NYSE and Nasdaq and other financial vehicles. There are benefits to adding commodities to a retail investor portfolio (such as a hedge against inflation and a typically low correlation with more traditional asset prices), experts caution that commodities are usually volatile investments.

The Nasdaq 100 index tracks the exchange's 100 largest non-financial companies

This index was created in 1985, over a decade after the Nasdaq first launched. The companies on the index must meet certain criteria, including having a minimum average daily trading value of $5M.

Why does the stock market matter?

Open any newspaper, turn on your local TV news station, or listen to a daily business radio segment, and you’re bound to hear about how the stock market is performing. Netflix created a 17-minute (free) explainer that dives deep into the nitty-gritty of how we got here.

Earnings season—the time period at the end of each quarter when many public companies release their earnings reports—offers a chance for investors and Wall Street analysts to evaluate how a wide range of companies are performing at once.

ETFs and mutual funds both pool money into a basket of investments—but the key difference between them is that mutual funds trade just once per day after the market closes, while ETFs trade like stocks throughout the day at fluctuating prices.

Retail investors are individuals who trade stock for themselves

Institutional investors, on the other hand, are investing for someone else. There are big differences between the two, one being that institutional investors can be granted certain special treatment (like being able to purchase IPOs right away).

See a real-time list of the most shorted stocks in the US

Every two weeks, the Nasdaq and New York Stock Exchange release the stocks with the most short positions. Some of the companies with the highest short positions as of early 2026 were Hims & Hers and Groupon.

A stock market timeline

The stock market has come a long way since the 1600s, when the first version of a stock exchange was created in Amsterdam. Mile markers along the way include everything from the Dow Jones Industrial Average's creation in 1896 to the stock market woes during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

ETFs were first created as an alternative to mutual funds, combining the diversification benefits of a mutual fund with the ability to trade throughout the day on a stock exchange.

The number of publicly traded companies has decreased in recent years.

In 1996, more than 7,300 companies traded publicly on US stock markets, but that number has recently dropped to 4,300. Economists point to two reasons: First, going public requires full disclosure of operations, exposing it to scrutiny from investors, competitors, and analysts. Second, the IPO process is expensive and time-consuming.

The world's oldest stock exchange was called the Amsterdam Stock Exchange

What is now referred to as Euronext Amsterdam got its start centuries ago, in the early 1600s. Back then, it was called the Amsterdam Stock Exchange—and it might not have existed without the Dutch East India Co.'s desire to raise funding for its seafaring ventures.

The history of Wall Street as a financial center dates back to the 1700s, beginning with the establishment of the New York Stock Exchange and New York City's first official slave market.

Spot markets are where commodities intended for relatively immediate delivery are traded

Spot markets are where physical securities are exchanged for cash. Also known as cash markets or physical markets, the trades are relatively immediate—both parties agree to an immediate transfer. Currencies and securities can also be traded on spot markets.

Some experts and investors think short selling—a strategy in which investors bet that a stock will drop in value—helps keep the market healthy.

There's a grading room on the eighth floor of the New York Stock Exchange where experts loudly slurp coffee and then spit it out to test its quality.

Retail investors are average joes, while institutional investors often move billions of dollars a day

Retail investors often trade 100 shares at a time, while institutional investors trade 10,000 or more. The biggest difference is that, unlike retail investors, institutional investors are professionals who are trading someone else’s money.

Investment banking jobs are famous for their long hours

Although some banks report attempts to cap hours for junior employees at 80 hours per week, these employees often continue working many more hours than that. Goldman Sachs analysts, for instance, went viral back in 2021 when they put together a PowerPoint deck complaining of 100-hour work weeks and mental health struggles.

Open-end and closed-end mutual funds differ in how they create and distribute shares.

Shorting is a high-risk and expensive investment strategy that hedge funds specialize in

Most investors buy stocks with the expectation that those stocks will be worth more tomorrow than they are today. Short selling, known as “shorting,” a stock is the opposite: The investor is betting the stock will drop in value.

Investors need a 'margin account' to short sell stock

Margin accounts are leveraged accounts through brokerage firms that allow investors to make trades without the full amount of capital on hand. Similar to a secured loan, margin accounts often require some form of collateral and typically have a cap on how much investors can borrow. However, trading with a margin account is much riskier than a traditional investment account. Fees and charged interest are due on margin accounts, regardless of trade performance, meaning it's possible for investors to lose more money than just their initial investment.

Retail investing by the numbers

When average Americans began pouring into the stock market, Wall Street wasn’t sure if its new guests were there to stay. But at the end of 2023, Public confidently declared that retail investors “weren’t going anywhere” after 30 million new individuals began buying and selling stock. Download the report to learn more here.

Before it became the home of 24-hour prestige TV, HBO used to sign off each night.

What is Silicon Alley?

The term "Silicon Alley" refers to an area in New York City once known for its high-tech startups, especially during the dot-com boom. Silicon Alley ran from New York City's Flatiron District through Soho to the Financial District. After the dot-com bubble burst, tech companies spread out through the rest of Manhattan and Brooklyn. Learn more about the area and how it compared to Silicon Valley in this article.

More than 650 companies went public in the US in 1996

As the dot-com bubble reached its peak, most dot-com companies went public with little proof of being profitable and were often overvalued. In 1999, the Nasdaq's price-to-earnings ratio (a tool used to determine a stock's value that divides its price by earnings) hit 90.2, signaling that many companies were operating at a net loss. Startups promised investors that more time and money would help scale their businesses and become profitable.

40 key stock market terms, explained

Liquidity. Forex. Capitalization. Blue chip stocks. These are just a few pieces of stock market vocabulary most people who don't spend all day on a trading floor might not know. Thankfully, we found a fun infographic that makes it easier to learn what 40 key stock market terms mean and why each of them matters.

How exchanges like the Chicago Mercantile act as trading referees

Chicago's Mercantile Exchange emphasizes futures contracts on commodities. This podcast episode breaks down how exchanges actually work, make money, and streamline the market.

Dual-class stock structures separate equity and decision-making authority

In the past few decades, dual-class stock structures have become an increasingly popular way for companies to raise capital in public markets without allocating traditional shareholder voting rights. Meta, Estée Lauder, and The New York Times are companies that are famously dual-class.

During Prohibition, 'happy hour' became the go-to term for illegally having a drink after work before heading to dinner

This article provides a timeline of happy hour’s shifting shape in US culture, from the first recorded happy hour on a US Naval ship to today’s happy hours that sometimes include non-alcoholic beverages. It also details how prohibition actually helped establish the tie between alcoholic beverages and happy hour.

In early 2021, GameStop's stock surge brought retail investing into the spotlight.