Australian Stock Exchange Limited

The Australian Stock Exchange Limited (ASX) was established in 1987 by the merger of six independent stock exchanges that previously operated in the capital cities. Each of those independent stock exchanges can be dated back to the 19th century.

In 1996, the ASX members decided to transform the exchange from being a mutual organization of stockbrokers to becoming a listed company. In 1998, the change of status took place and the very next day ASX shares were listed for trading on ASX's own market.

Australian Stock Exchange Limited is the holder of an Australian market license under the Corporations Act. ASX operates a market for securities issued by listed companies. To protect the integrity of that market, ASX has high standards for behavior of listed companies in its Listing Rules. The reputation of ASX's markets for fairness and integrity is extremely important to ASX and in order to maintain it there is a constant and vigilant supervision of the market.

Orders are queued and traded according to price-time priorities. There are strict regulations governing order priorities. Furthermore, there are strict rules governing when and how a disclosed quantity may be used and they way that it is traded by SEATS.

An algorithm is used to calculate opening and closing prices, prices for new listings and Initial Public Offerings. The algorithm guarantees that all trades at market open, market close, new listings or IPOs occur at the same price, in spite of the original order price.