The Beirut Stock Exchange (BSE, Arabic: بورصة بيروت) is the principal and only

stock exchange A stock exchange, securities exchange, or bourse is an exchange where stockbrokers and traders can buy and sell securities, such as shares of stock, bonds and other financial instruments. Stock exchanges may also provide facilities for ...

Lebanon Lebanon, officially the Republic of Lebanon, is a country in the Levant region of West Asia. Situated at the crossroads of the Mediterranean Basin and the Arabian Peninsula, it is bordered by Syria to the north and east, Israel to the south ...

. Located in

Beirut Beirut ( ; ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, just under half of Lebanon's population, which makes it the List of largest cities in the Levant region by populatio ...

, it is a public institution run by a committee including a chairman, a vice-chairman and eight members appointed via a decree issued by the Council of Ministers, in accordance with a proposal by the Minister of Finance. All BSE members are Lebanese Joint stock companies (SAL) with a capital above £L500,000 and registered at the secretariat of the Commercial Register in. Members include

holding companies A holding company is a company whose primary business is holding a controlling interest in the securities of other companies. A holding company usually does not produce goods or services itself. Its purpose is to own stock of other companies ...

and

offshore companies The term "offshore company" or "offshore corporation" is used in at least two distinct and different ways. An offshore company may be a reference to: * a company, Corporate group, group or sometimes a division thereof, which engages in offshorin ...

. The BSE authorizes

Brokerage firm A broker is a person or entity that arranges transactions between a Purchasing, buyer and a sales, seller. This may be done for a commission (remuneration), commission when the deal is executed. A broker who also acts as a seller or as a buyer b ...

s the operation and trade in securities listed on the BSE according to the Bourse trading system and also lists the issuing companies (called " Listed companies") that have any of their stocks or other financial instruments listed. In January 2024 the market value of the Exchange was 20.4 billion USD.

History

Beirut Stock Exchange, the second oldest market in the region, was established in 1920 by a decree of the French commissioner. Trading at that time was concentrated on gold and currency transactions, however in the 1930s there was an inflow of French,

Syrian Syrians () are the majority inhabitants of Syria, indigenous to the Levant, most of whom have Arabic, especially its Levantine and Mesopotamian dialects, as a mother tongue. The cultural and linguistic heritage of the Syrian people is a blend ...

and local Lebanese investment which made it possible for the BSE to flourish, especially with the establishment of mixed Lebanese-French joint stock companies that were quoted simultaneously on the

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

and Beirut Stock Exchanges. The activity in the 1950s and 1960s increased with the enlisting of various banking, industrial and services companies along with an amount of 50 listed bonds. The

Lebanese Civil War The Lebanese Civil War ( ) was a multifaceted armed conflict that took place from 1975 to 1990. It resulted in an estimated 150,000 fatalities and led to the exodus of almost one million people from Lebanon. The religious diversity of the ...

broke out in 1975 and trading declined significantly until it was halted entirely in 1983. The suspension was meant to last two years, but only in 1994 the government established a new administrating committee (in collaboration with the '' Bourse de Paris'') re-launched the BSE with a new internal bylaw, re-structured and streamlined mechanisms and trading systems. A new automated brokers system was introduced, based on the fixing price instead of the traditional OTC voice brokers. On November 22, 1996, the BSE officially re-launched the trading activity in its hall. The BSE and ''Bourse de Paris'' signed a cooperation agreement in June 1999 and the new

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

an NSC-

UNIX Unix (, ; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multi-user computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, a ...

–

Euronext Euronext N.V. (short for European New Exchange Technology) is a European bourse that provides trading and post-trade services for a range of financial instruments. Traded assets include regulated equities, exchange-traded funds (ETF), warrant ...

system was set. In 2000, new forms of securities were listed such as GDR (

Global Depository Receipt A global depository receipt (GDR and sometimes spelled ''depositary'') is a general name for a depositary receipt where a certificate issued by a depository bank, which purchases Share (finance), shares of foreign companies, creates a Security ( ...

investment fund An investment fund is a way of investment, investing money alongside other investors in order to benefit from the inherent advantages of working as part of a group such as reducing the risks of the investment by a significant percentage. These ad ...

s shares,

preferred stock Preferred stock (also called preferred shares, preference shares, or simply preferreds) is a component of share capital that may have any combination of features not possessed by common stock, including properties of both an equity and a debt ins ...

s, priority shares and any other tradable derivatives. In late 2006, the BSE launched a new Remote Trading System, allowing the

broker A broker is a person or entity that arranges transactions between a buyer and a seller. This may be done for a commission when the deal is executed. A broker who also acts as a seller or as a buyer becomes a principal party to the deal. Neither ...

s to trade with the securities listed on the BSE "remotely" from their own offices. In 2017 the Lebanese Council of Ministers issued a decree to privatize the BSE. The Cabinet approved in September 2017 a decree to establish the Beirut Stock Exchange SAL (BSE SAL) as a joint-stock company to replace the BSE.

Hours

The exchange has pre-trading sessions from 09:00am to 09:30am and normal trading sessions from 09:30am to 12.30pm on all days of the week except Saturdays, Sundays and holidays declared by the Exchange in advance.

List

The following companies are listed on the BSE:

References

External links

Beirut Stock Exchange official website
{{World Federation of Exchanges Financial services companies of Lebanon Companies based in Beirut Stock exchanges in the Middle East Stock exchanges in Asia Business in Lebanon Economy of Lebanon 1920 establishments in Lebanon Financial services companies established in 1920

History

Hours

List

See also

References

External links