PHLX - Philadelphia Stock Exchange

The oldest organized stock exchange in the U.S. is the Philadelphia Stock Exchange (PHLX), located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1790. In 1949 it merged with Baltimore Stock Exchange, then with Washington Stock Exchange in 1954 and with Pittsburgh in 1969. In 1981 Chicago Board of Trade and the Philadelphia Stock Exchange stopped trade after an anonymous call phoned in letting the trade center know that bombs had been placed in its building.

PHLX continues to lead in the development and introduction of original products and services and is one of North America's main marketplaces for the trading of equity options, stocks, currency and index options. The PHLX trades in more than 2,200 stocks, 922 equity options, 100 currency pairs and ten index options. PHLX's Philadelphia Automated Communication and Execution system is one of the first trading systems to be automated on the equity floor.

Then in 2005 a few large financial companies purchased stakes in the Exchange to try stopping the growing consolidation of stock trading by the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq. The firms that purchased stakes in the Exchange altogether owned 45% of the exchange.

The backbone of the Philadelphia economy has been traditionally manufacturing and other related distribution sectors. But since the end of the second World War this Industrial base has declined and today it has been geared more toward service-based and information businesses. This includes telecommunications, computer-based businesses, insurance companies, finance as well as the printing and publishing industries. Tourism in Philadelphia also contributes greatly to the local economy.

Philadelphia's economy is based largely on manufacturing; food; refining and financial services. Philadelphia produces a variety of items and goods, like chemicals, office and computing equipment, pharmaceuticals, biomedical products, paper products, processing foods, clothing, machinery and petrochemicals.

The Ports of Philadelphia are made up of three ports that being the Philadelphia port, Southern New Jersey and Delaware ports. The Ports of Philadelphia are considered the biggest freshwater shipping complex in the world, working with an immense volume of international tonnage along the East Coast. Imports include fruits, crude oil, paper, iron and steel with exports including petroleum and scrap metal products.

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