The Financial Capital of the World's Stock Exchange

The LSE Building in Paternoster Square

The second visit of today was to the London Stock Exchange (LSE). Now, to be frank, the LSE did not have have as much flavour as the BBC visit in the sense that I couldn't relate to it as much as I did with the former, but it was quite fascinating seeing how one single company shape the global economy. Yes, the LSE is a private company, not a government institution as is widely believed. It serves as an intermediary between investors who are seeking a return on investments and corporations who are seeking to raise capital to fund for their projects. As the liaison, the LSE provides a state of the art, cyber, secured, trading platform where stock brokers and jobbers meet to trade securities on behalf of their clients (i.e. the investor).

Another myth about the LSE that today's speaker dispelled that there is no actual trading floor with hundreds of men and women shouting like in the New York Stock Exchange. Instead, the LSE had a virtual trading floor, which meant that thousands of investors and traders could meet virtually from every corner of the world to place their "buy" and "sell" bids. Not only did this allow more efficiency by allowing traders to trade in real time, but was a more secure way of ensuring that no one can "beat the market" by illegally manipulating information.

Although I never took a particular interest in the Financial Services sector, I found this visit to be quite informative in that it revealed how capital markets function, why they are so important, and how they are one of the cornerstones of a robust economy.

In my opinion, the best thing about the visit was its central location in the heart of London, where I managed to take some more photos (unfortunately photography inside the LSE is strictly off limits).

Views of St. Paul's Cathedral from the LSE