what was the first stock market to open in North America, and when did the Canadian market open for business?
Fred Ketchen: Well, Michael, the first stock market in North America was, of course, the New York Stock Exchange. It was established back in 1792 when the so-called “Buttonwood Agreement” was signed. Several brokers agreed to trade securities for a fee and that kind of trade had been taking place on the sidewalk around this buttonwood tree, thus the name of that agreement. In the beginning, only five securities were listed on the New York Stock Exchange; three of them were government bonds, which had been created to finance the Revolutionary War. The other two were bank stocks. Bank of America was, in fact, the first stock to be listed. And based on the number of companies listed for trading, the New York Stock Exchange is the sixth largest in the world. Now, here in Canada, the Montreal Stock Exchange began in 1832 at the Exchange Coffee House as an informal stock exchange. The formal agreement wasn’t signed until 1874. The Toronto Stock Exchange started in 1852 when an association of
