Located at Dalal Street, Mumbai, India, the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) is the oldest exchange in Asia, and with more than 4,700 companies listed, it is believed to have the greatest number of listings in the world. Together with the National Stock Exchange of India, the BSE accounts for significant volumes of share trading in Asia.
Stock market trading at the BSE has come a long way since the 1850s when stock brokers would conduct business in the shade of the banyan trees outside Mumbai’s Town Hall. As the number of stock brokers steadily increased, the location of the bustling trade moved location a number of times before finally settling in Dalal Street in 1874, becoming an official organization under the name of “The Native Share & Stock Brokers Association” the following year.
Some of the highlights of the ongoing developments at the BSE include becoming the first exchange to operate under the government’s Securities Contracts Regulation Act in 1956; the launch in 1986 of the BSE Sensex to measure the overall performance of the exchange; the opening of its derivatives market in 2000; and the transition from its historic open-cry floor trading exchange to an electronic trading system in 1995. Moreover, BSE was the second exchange in the world to obtain an ISO 9001:2000 certification.
The services provided by the BSE include a transparent market for trading in equity, derivatives and debt instruments, with a presence in close to 360 of India’s towns and cities. The BSE actively supports the investor protection fund, and carried out an investor awareness program entitled “Safe Investing in the Stock Market” in more than 200 cities nationwide. BSE On-line Trading (BOLT) is available in more than 25,000 trader workstations across India, while BSEWEBX.com enables investors to trade on the BSE platform irrespective of where they may be based. The BSE Training Institute (BTI) works along with selected management institutes and universities to offer in-depth courses on the capital market and financial sector, thereby training the investors and brokers of the future to get the most benefit out of stock market trading.
