| BSE History
The BSE's roots go back to the 1830s, when Bostonians were looking for new ways to invest the wealth they had earned through shipping, banking and insurance. As New England's—and the nation's—industry grew, capital had to be raised to expand the region's businesses and fund larger enterprises. To meet this need, 13 business leaders founded the Boston Stock Exchange in 1834 as the third U.S. stock exchange, creating a meeting place for local stockbrokers to trade their shares. Initially, only the stocks of local banks and insurance companies were traded on the new exchange. Soon mill, railroad, utility and canal stocks were added. In 1878, AT&T was listed, just two years after Alexander Graham Bell had invented the telephone in his Boston workshop. In fact, capital raised in Boston funded many of the factories, mines and railroads that fueled the economic expansion of the United States in the 19th and 20th centuries. Today the BSE is an integral part of Boston's financial community, which is the third-largest investment management center in the world, eclipsed only by New York and London. Boston, the birthplace of the mutual fund, is now arguably the "mutual fund capital" of the world, with literally trillions of dollars invested in funds managed here. |
