Businessweek

The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc. offers trading, clearing, exchange technology, regulatory, securities listing, and public company services. The company’s offerings include trading and clearing across multiple asset classes, market data products, financial indexes, capital formation solutions, financial services, and market technology products and services. In the U.S., the company operates The NASDAQ Stock Market, a registered national securities exchange. The NASDAQ Stock Market is a single cash equities securities market in the U.S. In addition, in the U.S., it operates two additional cash equities trading markets, three options markets, and a futures market. The company also engages in riskless principal trading and clearing of over-the-counter (OTC), power, and gas contracts. In Europe, the company operates exchanges in Stockholm (Sweden), Copenhagen (Denmark), Helsinki (Finland), and Iceland as NASDAQ OMX Nordic, and exchanges in Tallinn (Estonia), Riga (Latvia) and Vilnius (Lithuania) as NASDAQ OMX Baltic. Collectively, the exchanges that comprise NASDAQ OMX Nordic and NASDAQ OMX Baltic offer trading in cash equities, bonds, structured products and exchange traded funds (ETFs), as well as trading and clearing of derivatives and clearing of resale and repurchase agreements. Through NASDAQ OMX First North, its Nordic and Baltic operations also offer alternative marketplaces for smaller companies. The company also operates NASDAQ OMX Armenia. In addition, NASDAQ OMX Commodities operates the power derivatives exchange, a carbon exchanges, and together with Nord Pool Spot, N2EX, a marketplace for physical U.K. power contracts. The company also operates NOS Clearing, a Norway-based clearinghouse primarily for OTC traded derivatives for the freight market and seafood derivatives market. Products and Services MARKET SERVICES The company offers trading on multiple exchanges and facilities across various asset classes, including cash equities, derivatives, debt, commodities, structured products, and ETFs. In addition, in some of the countries where it operates exchanges, the company also provides clearing, settlement, and depository services. U.S. Transaction Services In the U.S., the company offers trading in cash equity securities, derivatives, and ETFs on its cash equities, options, and futures markets; and engages in riskless principal trading of OTC power and gas contracts through NASDAQ OMX Commodities Clearing (NOCC). The company’s transaction-based platforms in the U.S. provide market participants with the ability to access, process, display, and integrate orders and quotes for cash equity securities, derivatives, and ETFs. The platforms allow the routing and execution of buy and sell orders, as well as the reporting of transactions for cash equity securities, derivatives, and ETFs. Cash Equities Trading: The NASDAQ Stock Market is a single pool of liquidity for trading U.S.-listed cash equities. The company also operates two additional U.S. cash equities markets, called NASDAQ OMX BX and NASDAQ OMX PSX. With these markets, the company offers a second and third quote within the U.S. cash equities marketplace. The company’s electronic U.S. transaction-based platforms provide members with the ability to access, process, display, and integrate orders and quotes in cash equity securities. Market participants include market makers, broker-dealers, alternative trading systems (ATSs), and registered securities exchanges. These services are offered for NASDAQ-listed and non-NASDAQ-listed securities. Specifically, its platforms provide a display of the interest by market participants at the highest price a participant is willing to buy a security (best bid) and also the lowest price a participant is willing to sell that security (best offer); subscribers quotes, orders and total anonymous interest at every price level for exchange-listed securities and critical data for the Opening Cross, Closing Cross, Halt Cross and IPO Cross; and anonymity to market participants, which can contribute to improved pricing for securities by reducing the potential market impact that transactions by investors whose tradi