The Canadian stock market began modestly in 1861. With a membership fee of only $5.00 and trading only 18 stocks, the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) entered the marketplace. By 1901, scarcely forty years after its birth, the Toronto Stock Exchange reached the million trades per year milestone and had admitted one hundred companies to the Exchange. By 1926, the trading volume increased ten-fold. Shortly thereafter, the Toronto Stock Exchange merged with the Standard Stock and Mining Exchange, creating the third largest marketplace in North America. The Exchange implemented the world’s first Computer Assisted Trading System, and was the first marketplace in North America to launch decimal trading.

Researching the Canadian Stock Market

As with any investment, research pays high dividends. The Toronto Stock Exchanges is a wholly owned subsidiary of the TMX Group Inc. The TMX Group provides valuable online tools for an individual interested in exploring the Canadian marketplace. Through its web site at tmx.com, the Group provides a monthly trading summary for all of its exchanges – the Toronto Stock Exchange, TSX Venture Exchange, the Montreal Exchange, ant the Natural Gas Exchange. The report includes a three-month history of the trading volume for each exchange, the value of the stocks traded, the number of transactions, and the daily averages. This information provides insight into the stability of the marketplace as a whole.

The TMX Group also provides a monthly financing summary of the Toronto Stock Exchange and TSX Venture Exchange. These monthly summaries include year-to-date statistics by which the market performance can be measured. Yearly summaries both for the Toronto Stock Exchange and the TSX Venture Exchange add to the overall picture of the marketplace’s health. Free seminars and daily market snapshots ensure that individual investors have all of the necessary information to make informed investment decisions.

Investing in the Canadian Stock Market

The Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, the Bank of Montreal, the Bank of Nova Scotia, the Royal Bank of Canada, and the Toronto-Dominion Bank all trade through the Toronto Stock Exchange. This marketplace is also the primary listing of such energy companies as Cameco Corporation, Canadian Natural Resources, Canadian Oil Sands Trust, and others. The Exchange Trade Funds (ETF) portfolios are an excellent way to diversify one’s investments. The TMX Group provides sector profiles on Mining, Diversified Industries, Clean Technologies, Life Sciences, Structured Products, Income Trusts, Energy and Energy Services, and Technology to enable individual investors to choose the portfolio that will best meet their needs and interests in the Canadian stock market.

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