History of stock exchange

The forefront of commercial innovation eventually shifted from Italy to northern Europe. The Hanseatic League, an alliance of mercantile towns such as Bruges and Antwerp, operated counting houses to expedite trade. The term "bourse," which would become synonymous with "stock market," arose in Bruges, either from a sign outside a trading center showing one or a few purses (bursa is Latin for bag) or because merchants gathered at the house of a man named Van der Burse; nobody's quite sure.
By the late 1500s, British merchants were experimenting with joint-stock companies intended to operate on an ongoing basis; one such was the Muscovy Company, which sought to wrest trade with Russia away from Hanseatic dominance. The next big step was in Amsterdam. In 1602, the Dutch East India Company was formed as a joint-stock company with shares that were readily tradable. The stock market had begun.