NEW YORK, Jan 20: Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz on Friday earned here the rare distinction of being the first Pakistani head of government to open trading on the world’s largest equities market, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).

The prime minister opened the trading by ringing the traditional bell at exact 0930 hrs local time. The ring marks the opening and closing of each trading day on many organized financial exchanges.

According to traders at the NYSE, prime minister’s ringing of the bell was an acknowledgement of his economic acumen and his sound policies that turned around Pakistan’s economy.

The New York Stock Exchange traces its origins to more than 200 years back and is the world’s leading and most technologically advanced equities market. On an average day 1.6 billion shares, valued at $56.1 billion, are traded on the NYSE. The exchange maintained 78.6 per cent share of trading in its listed stocks during its regular trading hours in 2005.

The NYSE has around 2,800 listed companies with a combined 21.4 trillion dollar total global market capitalization, more than four times the size of any other market. Of these 450 non-US companies from 47 countries represent a total global market capitalization of 7.9 trillion dollars.

According to the NYSE officials more capital is raised here than in any other equity market.

The companies listed on the NYSE meet the most stringent listing requirements of any marketplace, and range from the large well-known blue chips of many of the world’s leading technology companies as well as of young high growth enterprizes.

Mr Aziz in his comments in the visitors’ book wrote: “It is a real pleasure to visit the NYSE, clearly the centre of capital markets in the world.”—APP