What is a stock exchange?
A stock exchange is a global electronicmarketplace where securities are purchased and sold. It is where traders, stockbrokers, buyers, and sellers can trade in equities products. Stock exchanges permit companies to increase their capital.
How does a stock exchange work?
Once a business issues its shares to new owners to raise capital, the new owners try to find someone to sell their share. For these new owners to find buyers is a hassle. However, to sell their share in the secondary market, a stock exchange makes their lives much easy.
What are the global market timings as per India?
There are two prominent stock exchanges in India:
- Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE)
- National Stock Exchange (NSE)
There are different timings of the global market. Sellers and buyers must know the timings of the Global Market to trade in the time slots accordingly. The Global Market timings give a window for when exchanges can occur. Many orders are placed before the market even opens but, trading is only executed during a region’s market timings.
Indian stock markets function between 9:15 AM and 3:30 PM (IST). There are many stock markets globally that functions on their timings. Timings of the global market vary.
Generally, trading is conducted from Monday to Friday, while the rest of the days are off. Other days off may be those which are declared by the stock exchanges.
Below is a table containing some global market timings as per India:
| STOCK EXCHANGE | COUNTRY | OPENING TIME (IST) | CLOSING TIME (IST) |
| Japan Exchange Group | Japan | 5:30 AM | 11:30 AM |
| Australian Securities Exchange | Australia | 5:30 AM | 11:30 AM |
| Korea Exchange | South Korea | 5:30 AM | 11:30 AM |
| Taiwan Stock Exchange | Taiwan | 6:30 AM | 11:00 AM |
| Hong Kong Stock Exchange | Honk Kong | 6:45 AM | 1:30 PM |
| Shanghai Stock Exchange | China | 7:00 AM | 12:30 PM |
| Shenzhen Stock Exchange | China | 7:00 AM | 12:30 PM |
| Deutsche Borse | Germany | 12:30 PM | 2:30 PM |
| JSE Limited | South Africa | 12:30 PM | 8:30 PM |
| Euronext | European Union | 12:30 PM | 9:00 PM |
| SIX Swiss Exchange | Switzerland | 1:30 PM | 10:00 PM |
| BME Spanish Exchange | Spain | 1:30 PM | 10:00 PM |
| London Stock Exchange | U.K. and Italy | 1:30 PM | 10:00 PM |
| BM&F Bovespa | Brazil | 6:30 PM | 1:30 AM |
| New York Stock Exchange | USA | 7:00 PM | 1:30 AM |
| NASDAQ | USA | 7:00 PM | 1:30 AM |
| TMX Group | Canada | 8:00 PM | 2:30 AM |
Top 20 stock exchange operators as of March 2021:
Stock market ranks, as a whole, give a picture of how well the stock market is performing.
There are plenty of ways to determine stock market ranks. These include book value, total sales, market capitalization, cash flow, dividend yield, and investors’ returns.
Below is a list of the best-performing stock market in the year 2021:
| STOCK EXCHANGE OPERATORS | MARKET CAPITALIZATION IN TRILLION U.S. DOLLARS | |
| 1 | NYSE, United States | 26.23 |
| 2 | NASDAQ, United States | 19.34 |
| 3 | Shanghai Stock Exchange, China | 6.5 |
| 4 | Hong Kong Exchanges, Hong Kong | 6.48 |
| 5 | Shenzhen Stock Exchange, China | 4.9 |
| 6 | Euronext, Europe | 4.88 |
| 7 | LSE Group, U.K. and Italy | 3.67 |
| 8 | National Stock Exchange of India | 2.57 |
| 9 | TSX Group, Canada | 2.5 |
| 10 | Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul) | 2.42 |
| 11 | Bombay Stock Exchange, India | 2.22 |
| 12 | Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Germany | 2.06 |
| 13 | South Korea Stock Exchange | 2.05 |
| 14 | Stockholm Stock Exchange, Sweden | 1.91 |
| 15 | Swiss Stock Exchange, Switzerland | 1.76 |
| 16 | ASX Australian Securities Exchange | 1.53 |
| 17 | Taiwan Stock Exchange | 1.51 |
| 18 | Brazil Stock Exchange | 1.2 |
| 19 | Johannesburg Stock Exchange | 1.09 |
| 20 | Tehran Stock Exchange, Iran, South Africa | 1.08 |