The Wall Street stock market is a hub of financial activity, representing the interests of many different financial institutions. It is also the name given to the New York Stock Exchange, which is the most important equities market in the world. Today, much of trading on Wall Street takes place online. In the past, Wall Street was a traditional street, but the technology and internet have changed the entire system.
In the third quarter, stocks closed with a loss, the first time in seven years that stocks have posted three consecutive quarterly losses. The S&P 500 fell about 1.5 percent, as investors worried about the Fed raising interest rates to combat inflation. Meanwhile, the Australian stock market closed two percent lower, or 159 points lower, on stagflation fears. The property and tech sectors were the most negatively affected.
The Wall Street area became a bustling center for trade in the 1700s, but the area did not become an important financial center until 1792, when 24 prominent merchants and brokers signed the Buttonwood Agreement. This document outlined the creation of a membership-only stock exchange, and the first securities traded were war bonds and banking stocks for institutions.
The stock market crash of 1929 brought about the Great Depression, which impacted more than a quarter of the working population. This era of turmoil changed nearly every facet of society and fundamentally altered the way that a generation looked at the financial markets. Today, speculators trade high-risk assets and can make significant gains and losses.
