Martha Stewart Living example essay topic

The National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations - once an electronic quotation for OTC stocks and expressed by its acronym, NASDAQ, the stock exchange known today as NASDAQ or the NASDAQ Stock Market operates as both a stock quotes service and a stock exchange permitting dealers to trade its listed securities. NASDAQ Stock Market is owned and operated by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD) (TodaysMoneyNews. com). Established in 1792, the New York Stock Exchange in the largest securities exchange in the United States. Securities are traded by brokers and dealers for customers on the trading floor at 11 Wall Street in New York City. The exchange is headed by a board of directors that includes a chairman and 20 representatives who represent both the public and the members of the exchange. This board approves applicants as new NYSE dealers, set policies for exchange, oversees the exchange, regulates member activities, and lists securities (TodaysMoneyNews. com).

Taking these two definitions of each into consideration the similarities of both the NASDAQ and the NYSE are that they are both used for the listing of securities. Dealers are both able to sell and buy securities. Stock quotes are listed on both the NASDAQ and the NYSE. Both are available to the public mainly through dealers. The public can invest in both or either of the companies. There aren't many similarities between the two companies.

The differences between the New York Stock Exchange and the NASDAQ are more noticeable than the similarities. The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) provides the facilities for stock trading and rules under which trading takes place. Stock trading on the NYSE occurs auction-style. In each transaction, stock is sold to the highest bidder and bought for the lowest offer.

The types of companies traded on the NYSE are the oldest, largest, and best-known companies. Thousands of stocks are traded electronically - using computers and telephones - on the NASDAQ. A sophisticated electronic network run by the National Association of Securities Dealers lets brokers trade from their offices all over the country. Continuously updated prices are carried on their computer screens, while they buy and sell over the telephone. NASDAQ lists 5,500 companies - from small, emerging firms to corporate giants like Microsoft, Apple Computer and Intel. Many of the NASDAQ listings in every size category are in technology, telecommunications, banking, retail and other growth sectors".

The NYSE is primarily an auction market where, unlike dealer markets, most transactions are between an actual buyer and seller. One market maker is designated for each firm, the specialist, who oversees the market for the firm's stock. All offers to buy or sell the firm's shares at a specific price (limit orders) are recorded by the specialist in the order book. An incoming order to buy or sell the stock at the current price is executed either in a transaction with a floor trader, against and existing limit order, or against the specialist's ask or bid quotes. Such an order is either filled at the best available quote - the lowest ask price in the case of a buy order and the highest bid price in the case of a sell order - or at a price inside the quotes. The specialist participates only in a small portion of the NYSE transactions, whereas on NASDAQ a dealer has traditionally been on one side or the other of essentially every transaction and is on both sides of all inter-dealer transactions.

From 1998 to 2001 specialists participated in approximately 25-30 percent of all transactions on the NYSE - about equally divided between the buy side and the sell side. Specialist participation in transactions varies from stock to stock, and is inversely related to a stock's trading volume (Madhavan and Sofianos, 1998). Martha Stewart's conviction would seem like it would have hurt the company. Unfortunately, it may have looked like that at the beginning, but as time went on it improved. From the Martha Stewart Living website, the following is an overview of the company's four business segment: Publishing is MSO's largest business segment, accounting for 55%, or $135.9 million, of total revenues in 2003. In addition to being the key driver of the company's financial performance, Publishing also serves as a significant generator of content for our asset library.

Our Publishing business is made up of our magazines - Martha Stewart Living, Martha Stewart Weddings, and Special Interest Publications, including Martha Stewart Kids. Our newest magazine, Everyday Food: From the Kitchens of Martha Stewart Living, launched in 2003. Publishing also consists of nearly 40 Martha Stewart books, and a newspaper column published in approximately 200 newspapers. Our Television segment contributed 11%, or $25.7 million, of MSO's total revenues in 2003. Emmy Award-winning Martha Stewart Living is our longest-running broadcast, airing for one hour six days a week, hosted by Martha Stewart and featuring experts in the areas of crafts, gardening, collecting and organizing as well as world-renowned chefs and celebrated home cooks. Now in its eleventh season, the program is syndicated to approximately 150 stations spanning more than 50% of U.S. households.

Martha Stewart Living Television (MSLTV) also includes a cable program created from re purposed content of daily MSLTV show segments, from Martha's Kitchen, a prime-access cable program on The Food Network. A new program called Petkeeping with Marc Morrone, produced by Martha Stewart Living Television and hosted by Petkeeping expert Marc Morrone, premiered in September 2003. Through our Merchandising business segment, MSO sells products at multiple price points through distribution channels that span the retail pyramid. At the base of the pyramid is our mass-market retail program, the middle is the specialty retail channel, and the top is the high-end market, primarily served through our Internet / Direct Commerce segment (discussed below). In 2003, Merchandising represented 22%, or $53.4 million, of the company's revenues.

Martha Stewart Everyday, our mass-market brand label, offers essential products through Home, Garden, Kitchen, Holiday, Decorating, Keeping, Baby Baby, and Colors lines at Kmart in the United States, at Sears Canada, and at The Seiu Ltd. Stores in Japan. Martha Stewart Signature, MSO's specialty-tier brand label targeting a higher-end consumer than our essential mass-market products, includes our lines of fine fabrics developed in partnership with P / Kaufmann; indoor paints in 416 colors at Sherwin-Williams stores; broadloom carpeting, hardwood flooring, linoleum, and porcelain tile in partnership with Shaw Industries, Inc. ; and several collections of bedroom, dining room, and living room furniture created in conjunction with Bernhardt Furniture Company. Our Internet / Direct Commerce business segment is made up of our catalog, Martha Stewart: The Catalog For Living, martha stewart. com and. com, each representing an important part of our strategy. In 2003, this segment contributed 12%, or $30.8 million, of total revenues. Through our website, we deliver 'how-to' content and home-related products to our customers, providing yet another outlet for our advertisers to reach our loyal audiences and a convenient way to order or renew magazine subscriptions.

With this information you can also see the following is a chart of the last two years of the stock for the same company: Over the past two years it shows that the stock itself has grown above and beyond. With Martha Stewart being given the opportunity to host her own show after spending time in prison would show that it did not affect her company in a negative way. Unfortunately, with this comes the saying "Even bad publicity is publicity". The conviction had Martha Stewart on the mouths of most Americans. With even spending the time she had in prison the people are still investing in her company and products. She is still given the recognition that she had before her conviction.

Bibliography

1) Madhavan, A., Sofianos, G., 1998.
An Empirical Analysis of NYSE Specialist Trading. Journal of Financial Economics, 48,189-210.2) Martha Stewart. com. 2004 web) TodaysMoneyNews.
com. 2004.