Earlier this month, I had the honor of joining Joan Woodward, President of The Travelers Institute, on the podium of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). The Travelers Institute is the public policy division of The Travelers and recently celebrated its 15th anniversary. They do great public policy work ranging from flood education, distracted driving education, and most recently at the NYSE a Forces at Work Symposium to discuss Mental Health in America.
Being part of the “ringing of the bell” at NYSE was a surreal feeling. Growing up, I had always wondered what it was like to be a trader on the floor. The pictures of traders all crowded around the brokers and market makers and shouting what seemed like a foreign language to me and so chaotic it was hard to imagine the noise and confusion of it all.
Fast forward to being part of the opening bell ceremony on April 7, 2025, the trading floor was quite quiet and subdued. No crowds, no yelling, no chaos. April 7, 2025 was the Monday the week after tariff escalations happened. I had expected the “chaos” of the market reaction to the uncertainty and abruptness of what was going on. Yet, as Joan rang the bell and we cheered her on, the floor was quiet as the market dropped significantly within minutes. Most securities were trading in red and the ticker board was one big red square. The quietness was because today, most trading is electronic and driven by algorithms. The specialist at The Travelers window explained to us that he is there for some physical trading and market stability during volatile times, yet most is done electronically. So he often watches the financial news and has time to educate visitors like us. A far cry from my memories of the NYSE floor.
It is amazing the NYSE finds its origins in 1792. Its purpose is to provide a trading platform to give corporations the ability to raise capital and investors to invest in publicly traded companies. The NYSE has given buyers and sellers of equities the confidence in our capital raising and trading system that fuels entrepreneurs, innovation, growth, and economic advancement. The ringing of the bell dates back to the 1870s to signify the beginning of the continuous trading the NYSE facilitated. Today, average daily trading is over $350 billion dollars of value with a high quality investor confidence that has shown resilience through the Great Depression, September 11 terror attacks, and the Covid pandemic.
As we all wondered what a “worldwide tariff war” would do to our economy, we found some satisfaction that the core of capital liquidity, the NYSE, has endured through much adversity in our history.
Be Sure.
Joe