A few days ago we’ve taken a look at three of the main countries with exchanges – United States, England and Japan. Now lets have a look at one of the more obscure if you like countries that most people do not think of as trading nations.

Ireland for example has two exchanges the Irish Stock Exchange (ISE or ISEQ) and the Irish Empire exchange (IEX). The ISE actually came about through a merger of the County Cork and Dublin exchanges (both of which have been in existence since 1793).

From 1973 to 1995, the Irish Stock Exchange was a member of the International Stock Exchange of Great Britain and Ireland (now called the London Stock Exchange) but they broke the link with England in 1995. The ISE closed trading floor in Anglesea Street, Dublin 2, and turned to an electronic trading form called ISE Xtra. This is owned by Deutsche Borse Group which uses the same platform.

Even though it is not compulsory for them to do so most public limited companies use this exchange for their business. In more recent years the exchange has been under pressure with firms moving to the London and NASDAQ markets but this can only mean things can get better. As we all know with different markets in the past when things go down hill a bit they only have one way to go and that is up. This, I am glad to say, seems to be the way the Irish maket is going.

The Irish Empire Exchange is the newest of the two exchanges being launched on 12 April 2005. It was created to suit the needs of small to medium sized companies and for the ISE’s Developing Companies’ Market and Exploration Securities Market. It’s total listings so far is twenty two and requires a market capitalization of five million Euros.

The merger with the more successful Exploration Securities Market was envisaged to create a market of authoritative critical mass to appeal to micro-cap listings of Irish companies. Another reason it was created was so that the companies which had left the ISE market to go to London (because it was broadly less expensive) would have a choice to stay in their indigenous country.

The IEX has determined to be a great success as vivacious and vibrant companies such as Irish Estates, Abbey Homebuilders, AGI Therapeutics and Norkom used the market once they have come to it and finance an acquisition spree such as Newcourt and Irish Estates.

For future reference the IEX has seen an enormous innovation on the part of the ISE Trust. This is shown with the fact, that on opening the market had eight listed companies, has now grown to twenty-two. It is this quick growth and variety of business that the IEX should continue to succeed for many years to come.