Frankfurt stock exchange / Frankfurt
Floor fillers
Deutsche Börse, a public company since 2001, operates Germany’s biggest stock exchange, in Frankfurt. With locations in 14 countries, the company is valued at €26bn, making it one of the largest exchange organisations in the world. Since January, its crown jewel in Frankfurt has operated from this new state-of-the-art trading floor.
- DAX board
Annax
Wolfgang Elbert, a signage specialist, bought out part of Bosch in 1996 and launched his own display firm Annax Anzeigesysteme, based in Bavaria. As well as making the Frankfurt Stock Exchange’s DAX-board (an updated version has just been installed), Annax is also making LED displays for Vienna Airport’s new terminal.
- Trading company
ICF Kursmakler
ICF Kursmakler and Baader are the only two book runners for derivatives on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. The firm was founded in 1997 by 11 brokers at Frankfurt Stock Exchange. ICF is the only trading company at Frankfurt that develops IT systems in-house – the Munich Stock Exchange is run on ICF software.
- Deutsche Börse logo
Deutsche Börse
Deutsche Börse’s logo, which shows a blue ribbon fluctuating as a share price index, is designed by the bourse’s marketing department. “The rising logo symbolises the value we aim to create for our shareholders, customers and employees,” says spokesperson Leticia Adam. Lighting is by Swiss firm Neon Illuma.
- Computer programs
Xetra and Xontro
Frankfurt Stock Exchange created Xetra, an electronic securities trading platform, in 1997. Xetra is used in Vienna, Budapest, Dublin and Shanghai. Brain Trade, set up in 2000, operates the order-routing system Xontro on all German stock exchanges. Around 40 per cent of cash market transactions in Germany go through Xontro.
- Trading company
Baader
Even as an economics student, Uto Baader had his sights set on running a brokerage firm. Now 64, his firm Baader Wertpapierhandelsbank, which he founded in 1998, is one of Germany’s leading securities trading banks, managing nearly 300,000 order books. It has a permanent presence on the Frankfurt trading floor.
- Glass circles
Schott
Schott, Germany’s largest specialist glass maker (over €2bn in global sales in 2007), was founded in 1884 by Otto Schott. His firm invented the glass ceramics that are used in telescopes and TVs. Here, trading firms are enclosed inside Schott’s glass “circles”, which light up whenever a company first goes public on the trading floor.
- Interior design
Atelier Brückner
A revamp of the interior was completed in January by Stuttgart-based design agency Atelier Brückner. The Frankfurt Stock Exchange is now geared up to look good on the German evening news as well as being a desirable place to host special events – for example, it participated in the biennial Luminale light festival in April.
- Chairs
Sedus Stoll
Albert Stoll founded furniture company Sedus in Waldshut in Germany’s Black Forest in 1871. Today Sedus exports to more than 40 countries. Sedus has eight European subsidiaries, plus a new addition in Dubai, and reported nearly €194m turnover in 2007. The stockbrokers here sit on Sedus’s ergonomically designed Open Mind chairs.
