First 5-billion-share day

By: Ray Pellecchia

File Under: NYSE

• 4 Comments
• Email Entry

For NYSE Group markets, that is. Still. That's five, zero zero zero, zero zero zero, zero zero zero, plus. Quite a milestone-big number for us.

NYSE Group Volume Reaches New Record of 5.2 Billion Shares Traded; NYSE Sets Records in Crossing Session Volume and Orders at the Close:
NYSE Group volume reached a new all-time record with nearly 5.2 billion shares traded on Friday, June 22, compared with the previous record of 4.1 billion shares on Feb. 27, 2007. Investors seeking NYSE closing prices facilitated heavy trading at the close, resulting in record Crossing Session II volume of almost 1.4 billion shares traded.

The NYSE also achieved new records in both Market on Close orders and Limit on Close orders [as mentioned in this space last week]. Of the record orders executed at the close, there were 141,526 Market on Close orders, compared with the May/June average of 36,920; and 198,145 Limit on Close orders, compared with the May/June average of 20,364. NYSE Group received nearly 1.6 million orders during the last five minutes of trading.

"We are very pleased with the outstanding performance of our trading systems and operating technology, as evidenced by Friday's high level of user activity and demand," said NYSE Group President and Co-COO Duncan L. Niederauer. "The Russell rebalancing, as well as the heavily traded Blackstone IPO, for which specialists and brokers ensured a very orderly market from open to close, clearly demonstrated the quality of our marketplace and the viability of automation and human interaction working side-by-side. This record day also underscores the ongoing commitment of our staff, the specialists and brokers, and our member firms to ensure liquidity and operational integrity even in the most active markets, further highlighting the value of an NYSE execution." (NYSE.com)

2 Indian Offerings Raised $6 Billion in Global Offerings on NYSE; Largest deals by NYSE-listed Indian Companies include: Sterlite IPO, ICICI Follow-on Offering Yesterday, ICICI Bank Ltd. (NYSE: IBN), India's largest private-sector bank by assets, completed the largest offering by an Indian company, raising $4.3 billion in a global follow-on offering, half in the form of ADRs (excluding greenshoe)...On June 19, Sterlite Industries (India) Limited (NYSE: SLT), India's largest non-ferrous metals and mining company based on net sales, raised $1.75 billion (excluding greenshoe) in a global IPO on the NYSE. In its first day of trading, the ADR price rose over 9% to $14.70 on volume of 28.5 million ADRs. (NYSE.com)
[That's six, zero zero zero...]

Today in NYSE History: 26 Jun 1962 -- The NYSE's fourth census of shareownership revealed that 17 million Americans owned stock, an increase of 10 million since the first census taken in 1952.
[That's seventeen, zero zero zero,... OK, OK, I'll stop doing that now.

[Last I heard from SIA, now SIFMA, I believe the number of U.S. shareowners was somewhere north of 90 million. NYSE used to do our own shareholder survey every couple-few years, and it always made for interesting trendspotting and generated lots of news. Until someone had the bright idea of no longer doing the survey, which I still miss. -- RP]

One last bit of trivia: Born On This Day: Mick Jones (The Clash), 52; and Derek Jeter (baseball player nonpareil), 33.

Tags: New York Stock Exchange, Hybrid Market, NYSE, NYSE Euronext, NYX, trading, stock market, Russell, Blackstone, ICICI, Sterlite