The US stock market is made up of exchanges where you can buy and sell stocks.

Some examples of exchanges are NYSE (New York Stock Exchange), NASDAQ (National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotation System), and AMEX (American Stock Exchange).

NYSE is the largest stock market in the world, based on capitalization, with an annual turnover of approximately US$10 trillion (about US$40 billion per day). It is made up of some 3,800 publicly traded US companies.

NYSE Euronext, the holding company created by the combination of NYSE Group, Inc. and Euronext NV brings together six cash stock exchanges in five countries and six derivatives exchanges.

NASDAQ is another exchange that comprises around 3,700 stocks, mostly in the biotech and technology industries, with a turnover of about US$27 billion per day.

AMEX is another exchange that consists of around 1,200 securities.

More than 10,000 additional securities are available through the US national stock exchanges.

There are many different market indices in the US markets. The main indices used to measure the performance of the markets include the Dow Jones Industrial Average or DJIA, which includes 30 of the largest corporations in the United States.

There are many more indices, such as the Standard and Poor’s 500 (S&P 5000) which measures 500 companies that are leaders in their respective industries.

Other indices include the NASDAQ Composite Index, the AMEX Composite Index, and the Russell 2000 (composed of 2000 stocks), etc.

When we refer to the broader market, we are primarily referring to the DOW, NASDAQ, and S&P 500.

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