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105-607: Shanda Interactive Entertainment Limited was founded in December 1999 by Chen Tianqiao , Chrissy Luo, and Chen Danian . With headquarters in Shanghai , and USD $ 60,000 in startup capital, the company also raised $ 3 million to focus on online cartoons, gaming and virtual communities. Settling on online gaming, in 2001 the company used the final $ 300,000 of its startup funds to buy the Chinese rights to Legend of Mir II , licensing

210-528: A "cornerstone" of the NYSE, with a benefit of having all of a deal's players close at hand, including investment bankers , lawyers , and accountants . After Wall Street firms started to expand westward in the 1980s into New Jersey , the direct economic impacts of Wall Street activities have gone beyond New York City. The employment in the financial services industry, mostly in the "back office" roles, has become an important part of New Jersey's economy. In 2009,

315-498: A "phoenix-like resurrection" of the area, with residential, commercial, retail and hotels booming in the "third largest business district in the country". At the same time, the investment community was worried about proposed legal reforms, including the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act which dealt with matters such as credit card rates and lending requirements. The NYSE closed two of its trading floors in

420-522: A "tug-of-war" between business interests on Wall Street and authorities in Washington, D.C. , the capital of the United States by then. Generally during the 19th century Wall Street developed its own "unique personality and institutions" with little outside interference. In the 1840s and 1850s, most residents moved further uptown to Midtown Manhattan because of the increased business use at

525-529: A $ 4 stock transfer tax , stock clerks protested. At other times, city and state officials have taken steps through tax incentives to encourage financial firms to continue to do business in the city. A post office was built at 60 Wall Street in 1905. During the World War I years, occasionally there were fund-raising efforts for projects such as the National Guard . On September 16, 1920, close to

630-804: A 30 percent stake in NCsoft China, giving Shanda the rights to distribute the popular game Aion in China. Shanda Games Limited had become a business unit of Shanda Interactive by early 2008, and Shanda Interactive continued to diversify. In 2008, Shanda Interactive established Shanda Literature Limited as a business unit with former Sina executive editor Xiaoqiang Hou as CEO. Shanda Literature began offering literature and other publications through websites, offline publication and phones. The unit purchased Qidian, Hongxiu, and jjwxc.com, three of China's biggest literary portals, as well as publishing companies such as tingbook.com, Huawentianxia, and Zhongzhibowen. Qidian

735-827: A 9.9 percent stake in Baltimore 's Legg Mason that April, Shanda Group increased its stake in Lending Club to 15.1 percent in June, making it the company's single biggest investor. Shanda Group sold its 2 percent stake in Sotheby's in August 2016. By December 2016 it had also purchased a 13.8 percent stake in Community Health Systems . That month Shanda Group increased its stake in Legg Mason to 15%, remaining

840-554: A backwater in American life". During the New Deal years, as well as the 1940s, there was much less focus on Wall Street and finance. The government clamped down on the practice of buying equities based only on credit, but these policies began to ease. From 1946 to 1947, stocks could not be purchased " on margin ", meaning that an investor had to pay 100% of a stock's cost without taking on any loans. However, this margin requirement

945-476: A crash. They made a fortune but turned into the crisis's pantomime villains. Most, though, got burned – the banks are still gradually running down portfolios of non-core loans worth $ 800bn. The first months of 2008 was a particularly troublesome period which caused Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke to "work holidays and weekends" and which did an "extraordinary series of moves". It bolstered U.S. banks and allowed Wall Street firms to borrow "directly from

1050-519: A day which caused a "traffic jam" of paper with "batteries of clerks" working overtime to "clear transactions and update customer accounts". In 1973, the financial community posted a collective loss of $ 245 million, which spurred temporary help from the government. Reforms were instituted; the Securities & Exchange Commission eliminated fixed commissions, which forced "brokers to compete freely with one another for investors' business". In 1975,

1155-690: A deal that valued the company at $ 2.3 billion. According to the New York Times , it was "one of the biggest such deals involving a Chinese company." By the time Tianqiao Chen sold his stake in Shanda Games in 2014, Shanda Group had become an investment firm focused on the internet and finance. After expanding Shanda with a series of rapid acquisitions, by 2015 Shanda had invested in 140 companies. In 2016, Shanda Group acquired stakes in LendingClub , Legg Mason , and Sotheby's . After acquiring

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1260-488: A downturn with a sizable drop in year-end bonuses of $ 6.5 billion, according to one estimate from a state comptroller's office. To guard against a vehicular bombing in the area, authorities built concrete barriers, and found ways over time to make them more aesthetically appealing by spending $ 5000 to $ 8000 apiece on bollards . Parts of Wall Street, as well as several other streets in the neighborhood, were blocked off by specially designed bollards: ... Rogers Marvel designed

1365-431: A financial wall in the crisis. Foolishly and recklessly, the banks didn't look at these loans adequately, relying on flawed credit-rating agencies such as Standard & Poor's and Moody's, which blithely certified toxic mortgage-backed securities as solid ... A few of those on Wall Street, including maverick hedge fund manager John Paulson and the top brass at Goldman Sachs, spotted what was going on and ruthlessly gambled on

1470-617: A key magnet for the Wall Street remains the New York Stock Exchange Building . Some "old guard" firms such as Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch (bought by Bank of America in 2009), have remained "fiercely loyal to the Financial District" location, and new ones such as Deutsche Bank have chosen office space in the district. So-called "face-to-face" trading between buyers and sellers remains

1575-479: A move towards transforming itself into an electronic exchange. Beginning in September 2011, demonstrators disenchanted with the financial system protested in parks and plazas around Wall Street. On October 29, 2012, Wall Street was disrupted when New York and New Jersey were inundated by Hurricane Sandy . Its 14-foot-high (4.3 m) storm surge, a local record, caused massive street flooding nearby. The NYSE

1680-566: A new kind of bollard, a faceted piece of sculpture whose broad, slanting surfaces offer people a place to sit in contrast to the typical bollard, which is supremely unsittable. The bollard, which is called the Nogo, looks a bit like one of Frank Gehry's unorthodox culture palaces, but it is hardly insensitive to its surroundings. Its bronze surfaces actually echo the grand doorways of Wall Street's temples of commerce. Pedestrians easily slip through groups of them as they make their way onto Wall Street from

1785-485: A renewed push for capitalism and business , with national efforts to de-regulate industries such as telecommunications and aviation . The economy resumed upward growth after a period in the early 1980s of languishing. A report in The New York Times described that the flushness of money and growth during these years had spawned a drug culture of sorts, with a rampant acceptance of cocaine use although

1890-454: A roof and open sides, although walls may have been added over the years; it could hold approximately 50 people. New York's municipal authorities directly benefited from the sale of slaves by implementing taxes on every person who was bought and sold there. In these early days, local merchants and traders would gather at disparate spots to buy and sell shares and bonds, and over time divided themselves into two classes—auctioneers and dealers. In

1995-416: A turn south and ran along the shore until it ended at the old fort . There was a gate at Broadway (the "Land Gate") and another at Pearl Street, the "Water Gate." The wall and its fortifications were eventually removed in 1699—it had outlived its usefulness because the city had grown well beyond the wall. A new City Hall was built at Wall and Nassau in 1700 using the stones from the bastions as materials for

2100-533: A vast, neural spaghetti of wires, Web sites and trading platforms — the N.Y.S.E. is clearly no longer the epicenter. Nor is New York. The largest mutual-fund complexes are in Valley Forge, Pa. , Los Angeles and Boston , while trading and money management are spreading globally. Since the end of the cold war, vast pools of capital have been forming overseas, in the Swiss bank accounts of Russian oligarchs, in

2205-525: Is a Chinese businessman who founded Shanda . Chen was born in Xinchang County , Zhejiang Province, China in 1973 and grew up near Shanghai with his younger brother Danian . His father was an engineer and his mother was a middle school English teacher. He earned his bachelor's degree in economics from Fudan University in 1993. Chen started at the state-owned property developer Shanghai Lujiazui Group in 1994, holding management positions in

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2310-705: Is a street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City . It runs eight city blocks between Broadway in the west and South Street and the East River in the east. The term "Wall Street" has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, the American financial services industry , New York–based financial interests, or the Financial District. Anchored by Wall Street, New York has been described as

2415-703: Is home to the New York Stock Exchange , the world's largest stock exchange by total market capitalization , as well as the Federal Reserve Bank of New York , and commercial banks and insurance companies. Several other stock and commodity exchanges have also been located in Lower Manhattan near Wall Street, including the New York Mercantile Exchange and other commodity futures exchanges, along with

2520-533: Is married to Qianqian "Chrissy" Luo. They moved from Shanghai to Singapore in 2009, then from Singapore to the Bay Area of California in late 2017. They are currently residents of Menlo Park, California . In 2018, Chen bought a historic mansion built for Alice Gwynne Vanderbilt in 1881 on East 69th Street in the Upper East Side of Manhattan for $ 39 million. Wall Street Wall Street

2625-715: The Boston Consulting Group suggesting that 65,000 jobs had been permanently lost because of the downturn. But there were signs that Manhattan property prices were rebounding with price rises of 9% annually in 2010, and bonuses were being paid once more, with average bonuses over $ 124,000 in 2010. A requirement of the New York Stock Exchange was that brokerage firms had to have offices "clustered around Wall Street" so clerks could deliver physical paper copies of stock certificates each week. There were some indications that midtown had been becoming

2730-751: The Chinese Communist Party at age 18 and was elected to the central committee of Communist Youth League of China in Shanghai. In 2008, Chen was appointed to the 11th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). In 2013, Chen was appointed to the 12th National Committee of the CPPCC. Chen is chairman of the Shanda Group, and is also on the boards of various portfolio companies. Chen

2835-625: The Dutch West India Company , Peter Stuyvesant , at the start of the first Anglo-Dutch war soon after New Amsterdam was incorporated in 1653. Fearing an over land invasion of English troops from the colonies in New England (at the time Manhattan was easily accessible by land because the Harlem Ship Canal had not been dug), he ordered a ditch and wooden palisade to be constructed on the northern boundary of

2940-672: The Manhattan Institute was that the securities industry accounts for 4.7 percent of the jobs in New York City but 20.7 percent of its wages, and he estimated there were 175,000 securities-industries jobs in New York (both Wall Street area and midtown) paying an average of $ 350,000 annually. Between 1995 and 2005, the sector grew at an annual rate of about 6.6% annually, a respectable rate, but that other financial centers were growing faster. Another estimate, made in 2008,

3045-670: The NYSE American . Many brokerage firms owned offices nearby to support the business they did on the exchanges. The economic impacts of Wall Street activities extend worldwide. In the original records of New Amsterdam , the Dutch always called the street Het Cingel ("the Belt"), which was also the name of the original outer barrier street, wall, and canal of Amsterdam . After the English conquest of New Netherland in 1664, they renamed

3150-525: The U.S. state of New Jersey , and only two salespeople in New York City; the remaining 33 employees work in a center in Kansas. Wall Street in a conceptual sense represents financial and economic power. To Americans, it can sometimes represent elitism and power politics, and its role has been a source of controversy throughout the nation's history, particularly beginning around the Gilded Age period in

3255-637: The United States . At the time it was the largest IPO of a Chinese internet company in the United States, and shortly afterwards Shanda became the largest internet company by market capitalization in China. In October 2004 Shanda issued US$ 275 million convertible notes to be redeemable in October 2007. That month Shanda was operating eight games and hosting 1.2 million simultaneous players. As of May 2005, 300,000 locations, among them 130,000 internet cafes, sold prepaid cards for Shanda's games and game usage

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3360-422: The public relations office before becoming secretary to the chairman. In 1998, he became the vice director of the office of the president at Kinghing Trust & Investment before resigning in 1999. In 1999, Chen started the online gaming company Shanda with members of his family. The company went on to become the largest Internet company by market capitalization in China in 2004. That same year, Chen

3465-493: The subprime mortgage crisis from 2007 to 2010, Wall Street financing was blamed as one of the causes, although most commentators blame an interplay of factors. The U.S. government with the Troubled Asset Relief Program bailed out the banks and financial backers with billions of taxpayer dollars, but the bailout was often criticized as politically motivated, and was criticized by journalists as well as

3570-693: The "freemium" model was then uncommon in China. The change proved controversial in Wall Street and Shanda's share price initially dropped 70%. Shanda defended the change, arguing that free games accounted for most of the top titles in South Korea, a trend which could be replicated in China. It was later revealed that once Shanda's games adopted this model, average customer spending increased from 30 Chinese yuan to 55 Chinese yuan per quarter. Revenue rebounded after about nine months, and in 2006, Shanda Interactive's internet games sales increased 44 percent from

3675-667: The Fed" through a vehicle called the Fed's Discount Window, a sort of lender of last report. These efforts were highly controversial at the time, but from the perspective of 2010, it appeared the Federal exertions had been the right decisions. By 2010, Wall Street firms, in Clark's view, were "getting back to their old selves as engine rooms of wealth, prosperity and excess". A report by Michael Stoler in The New York Sun described

3780-555: The Financial Service cluster, there were three major sectors: more than 60 percent were in the securities industry ; 20 percent were in banking ; and 8 percent in insurance . Additionally, New Jersey has become the main technology infrastructure to support the Wall Street operations. A substantial amount of securities traded in the United States are executed in New Jersey as the data centers of electronic trading in

3885-597: The Fixed Income Clearing Corporation and Emerging Markets Clearing Corporation. Having a direct tie to Wall Street employment can be problematic for New Jersey, however. The state lost 7.9 percent of its employment base from 2007 to 2010 in the financial services sector in the fallout of the subprime mortgage crisis . Of the street's importance as a financial center, New York Times analyst Daniel Gross wrote: In today's burgeoning and increasingly integrated global financial markets —

3990-649: The Legg Mason board. Chen has invested in the venture funds Propel(x) and Ubiquity Ventures. Ranked on various rich lists, Chen personally had $ 4 billion in net value in 2017 and was ranked as the 93rd richest person in China, according to the Hurun Report . In 2018, Chen purchased 500,000 acres in Ontario . The same year, the Committee of 100 gave Chen an award for Lifetime Achievement as Tech Entrepreneur. According to China Youth Daily , Chen joined

4095-521: The New Amsterdam settlement. The wall was built of dirt and 15-foot (4.6 m) wooden planks, measuring 2,340 feet (710 m) long and 9 feet (2.7 m) tall and was built using the labor of both Black slaves and white colonists. In fact Stuyvesant had ordered that "the citizens, without exception, shall work on the constructions… by immediately digging a ditch from the East River to

4200-518: The North River, 4 to 5 feet deep and 11 to 12 feet wide..." And that "the soldiers and other servants of the Company, together with the free Negroes, no one excepted, shall complete the work on the fort by constructing a breastwork, and the farmers are to be summoned to haul the sod." The first Anglo-Dutch War ended in 1654 without hostilities in New Amsterdam, but over time the "werken" (meaning

4305-672: The SEC threw out the NYSE 's "Rule 394" which had required that "most stock transactions take place on the Big Board's floor", in effect freeing up trading for electronic methods. In 1976, banks were allowed to buy and sell stocks, which provided more competition for stockbrokers . Reforms had the effect of lowering prices overall, making it easier for more people to participate in the stock market. Broker commissions for each stock sale lessened, but volume increased. The Reagan years were marked by

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4410-536: The Shanghai vaults of Chinese manufacturing magnates and in the coffers of funds controlled by governments in Singapore, Russia, Dubai , Qatar and Saudi Arabia that may amount to some $ 2.5 trillion. An example is the alternative trading platform known as BATS , based in Kansas City , which came "out of nowhere to gain a 9 percent share in the market for trading United States stocks". The firm has computers in

4515-547: The U.S. equity market for all major stock exchanges are located in North and Central Jersey . A significant amount of securities clearing and settlement workforce is also in the state. This includes the majority of the workforce of Depository Trust Company, the primary U.S. securities depository ; and the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation , the parent company of National Securities Clearing Corporation,

4620-717: The United States, it is one of the larger owners of timberland in North America , In 2018, the company opened Shanda World, a large development in Shanghai with office and retail space with around 700,000 meters. Also in 2018, Shanda Group began focusing on neuroscience and brain-related companies, and had already invested in around "100 advanced technology ventures integrating virtual reality technology and neuroscience." As of 2018, Shanda Group has offices in Shanghai , Hong Kong , Singapore , New York and Menlo Park . Chen Tianqiao Chen Tianqiao ( Chinese : 陈天桥 ; pinyin : Chén Tiānqiáo ); born 1973)

4725-526: The Wall Street employment wages were paid in the amount of almost $ 18.5 billion in the state. The industry contributed $ 39.4 billion or 8.4 percent to the New Jersey's gross domestic product in the same year. The most significant area with Wall Street employment is in Jersey City . In 2008, the "Wall Street West" employment contributed to one third of the private sector jobs in Jersey City. Within

4830-403: The area around historic Trinity Church. Cars, however, cannot pass. The Guardian reporter Andrew Clark described the years of 2006 to 2010 as "tumultuous", in which the heartland of America was "mired in gloom" with high unemployment around 9.6%, with average house prices falling from $ 230,000 in 2006 to $ 183,000, and foreboding increases in the national debt to $ 13.4 trillion, but that despite

4935-563: The average. Business writer John Brooks in his book Once in Golconda considered the start of the 20th century period to have been Wall Street's heyday. The address of 23 Wall Street , the headquarters of J. P. Morgan & Company , known as The Corner , was "the precise center, geographical as well as metaphorical, of financial America and even of the financial world". Wall Street has had changing relationships with government authorities. In 1913, for example, when authorities proposed

5040-405: The buildings on Wall Street itself saw only little physical damage. One estimate was that 45% of Wall Street's "best office space" had been lost. The NYSE was determined to re-open on September 17, almost a week after the attack. During this time Rockefeller Group Business Center opened additional offices at 48 Wall Street . Still, after September 11, the financial services industry went through

5145-496: The city's tax revenue, and 22 percent of the city's total wages, including an average salary of US$ 360,700. The seven largest Wall Street firms in the 2000s were Bear Stearns , JPMorgan Chase , Citigroup , Goldman Sachs , Morgan Stanley , Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers . During the recession of 2008–10, many of these firms, including Lehman, went out of business or were bought up at firesale prices by other financial firms. In 2008, Lehman filed for bankruptcy, Bear Stearns

5250-426: The city's tax revenues and 20% of the state's, the downturn has had huge repercussions for government treasuries. New York's mayor Michael Bloomberg reportedly over a four-year period dangled over $ 100 million in tax incentives to persuade Goldman Sachs to build a 43-story headquarters in the Financial District near the destroyed World Trade Center site. In 2009, things looked somewhat gloomy, with one analysis by

5355-602: The clamor of business and trade and the owners complaining that they can't get anything done," according to a historian named Burrows. The opening of the Erie Canal in the early 19th century meant a huge boom in business for New York City, since it was the only major eastern seaport which had direct access by inland waterways to ports on the Great Lakes . Wall Street became the "money capital of America". Historian Charles R. Geisst suggested that there has constantly been

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5460-462: The coming of night and the suspension of business was entirely changed last night as hundreds of men worked under the glare of searchlights to repair the damage to skyscrapers that were lighted up from top to bottom. ... The Assay Office, nearest the point of explosion, naturally suffered the most. The front was pierced in fifty places where the cast iron slugs, which were of the material used for window weights, were thrown against it. Each slug penetrated

5565-449: The companies included in Dow's original calculations were American Tobacco Company , General Electric , Laclede Gas Company , National Lead Company , Tennessee Coal & Iron , and United States Leather Company . When the average "peaks and troughs" went up consistently, he deemed it a bull market condition; if averages dropped, it was a bear market . He added up prices, and divided by

5670-503: The company spun off Shanda Games in the largest IPO with the ticker GAME in the United States that year, raising $ 1.04 billion. At the time, Shanda Games provided 77 percent of Shanda Interactive's revenue, although the company also continued to be active in online literature, video, and other forms of entertainment. Shanda Literature controlled 90 percent of the online reading market in China by early 2010. That year Shanda Interactive recorded operating revenues of $ 232.3 million, 2% higher than

5775-575: The corner of Wall and Broad Street , the busiest corner of the Financial District and across the offices of the Morgan Bank , a powerful bomb exploded . It killed 38 and seriously injured 143 people. The perpetrators were never identified or apprehended. The explosion did, however, help fuel the Red Scare that was underway at the time. A report from The New York Times : The tomb-like silence that settles over Wall Street and lower Broadway with

5880-477: The corner of Wall and Broad streets", and in 1998, offered substantial tax incentives to try to keep it in the Financial District. Plans to rebuild it were delayed by the September 11 attacks. The exchange still occupies the same site. The exchange is the locus for a large amount of technology and data. For example, to accommodate the three thousand people who work directly on the exchange floor requires 3,500 kilowatts of electricity, along with 8,000 phone circuits on

5985-425: The dealer slipped him a heat-sealed plastic envelope of cocaine and he passed her cash, the transaction was being watched through the sunroof of her car by Federal drug agents in a nearby building. And the customer — an undercover agent himself -was learning the ways, the wiles and the conventions of Wall Street's drug subculture. In 1987, the stock market plunged, and, in the relatively brief recession following,

6090-416: The early 19th century, both residences and businesses occupied the area, but increasingly the latter predominated, and New York's financial industry became centered on Wall Street. During the 20th century, several early skyscrapers were built on Wall Street, including 40 Wall Street , once the world's tallest building. The street is near multiple subway stations and ferry terminals . The Wall Street area

6195-406: The economy changed from "agricultural to industrial to financial" and New York maintained its leadership position despite these changes, according to historian Thomas Kessner. New York was second only to London as the world's financial capital. In 1884, Charles Dow began tracking stocks, initially beginning with 11 stocks, mostly railroads. He looked at average prices for these eleven. Some of

6300-510: The end of 2002 the company had $ 42 million in revenue and $ 17 million in net profits, with an average of 280,000 people playing its games simultaneously. Shanda ceased partnering with WeMade in 2003 after a dispute over sharing profits on Legend of Mir 2 , developing its own game The World of Legend in-house. WeMade considered the game to be a copy of Mir 2 and sued, reaching a settlement in 2009. Legend of Mir 2 and World of Legend accounted for 87.5 percent of Shanda Interactive's revenue in

6405-643: The end of 2005 it had a market capitalization of $ 1.8 billion and was China's biggest gaming company. Founder Chen Tianqiao was estimated to have a net worth of $ 1.45 billion, with the press dubbing him the "Chinese Bill Gates ." In the summer of 2005, Shanda Interactive's revenue dropped significantly as its old hit Legend of Mir II began to lose subscribers. With the intent of extending the life of its older MMORPGs , in December 2005, Shanda announced that its three major games Magical Land , Woool , and Legend of Mir II would be forever be free to play . Allowing gamers to pay for in-game items instead of subscriptions,

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6510-573: The first quarter of 2004. To reduce dependence on those two games, Shanda released the self-developed game The Sign in February 2004, and by April was also working on the in-house titles Age and Magical Land . Shanda Interactive listed on the NASDAQ in May 2004, raising $ 152 million with the initial public offering (IPO) under the ticker SNDA and becoming the first Chinese online games company listed in

6615-499: The former investment firm of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette was described as a Wall Street firm but had its headquarters on Park Avenue in Midtown . A report described the migration from Wall Street: The financial industry has been slowly migrating from its historic home in the warren of streets around Wall Street to the more spacious and glamorous office towers of Midtown Manhattan. Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan Chase, Citigroup, and Bear Stearns have all moved north. Nevertheless,

6720-414: The foundation. Slavery had been introduced to Manhattan in 1626, but it was not until December 13, 1711, that the New York City Common Council made a market at the foot of Wall Street the city's first official slave market for the sale and rental of enslaved Black people and Indians. The market operated from 1711 to 1762 at the corner of Wall and Pearl Streets, and consisted of a wooden structure with

6825-613: The game from the South Korean company WeMade Soft . Published in China that September, the game began to turn a profit after two months. Expanding out of Shanghai city by city, Shanda Interactive shared its revenue with regional telecommunications companies. Because home internet access in China was limited at the time, Shanda Interactive began constructing a network of around 200,000 internet cafes . The company also began selling pre-paid cards to purchase game time, eventually establishing around 400,000 retail outlets. Shanda continued to license international online games after Mir II , and at

6930-453: The headquarters of banks. These include: Another key anchor for the area is the New York Stock Exchange Building at the corner of Broad Street . It houses the New York Stock Exchange , which is by far the world's largest stock exchange per market capitalization of its listed companies, at US$ 28.5 trillion as of June 30, 2018. City authorities realize its importance, and believed that it has "outgrown its neoclassical temple at

7035-610: The largest foreign owners of land in the United States. Tianqiao Chen and his family sold all their stakes in Shanda Games in November 2014, after which Shanda Group refocused on investing. With Chen remaining chairman and CEO, by early 2017 Shanda Group was the majority shareholder of Legg Mason , Lending Club , and Community Health Systems . It also had property operations in China and North America and stakes in companies such as Sotheby's . Shanda sold its stakes in Sotheby's in 2017 and then it sold its stake Legg Mason later that year, and then Chen resigned as vice-chairman of

7140-527: The largest shareholder in Lending Club and Community Health Systems, maintaining a minority stake in Legg Mason. By 2018, the venture capital arm of Shanda Group had invested in around 120 companies in China focused on internet and mobile software, and also had investments in around 30 "advanced technology companies" in Iceland , Indonesia , Russia , the United Kingdom , Israel , and the United States. Today it has also invested in over 55 early-stage, deep technology investment funds. With real estate in China and

7245-444: The largest shareholder. Shanda Group also gained two board seats in Legg Mason in 2017 and advised customizing Legg Mason's investment products for clients in China. At the start of 2017, Shanda Group had $ 8 billion in net assets under management. By 2018, Shanda Group invested in public markets, real estate and venture capital, focusing on companies in the fields of healthcare, financial services, media, and technology. Shanda remained

7350-415: The late 18th century, there was a buttonwood tree at the foot of Wall Street under which traders and speculators would gather to trade securities. The benefit was being in proximity to each other. In 1792, traders formalized their association with the Buttonwood Agreement which was the origin of the New York Stock Exchange . The idea of the agreement was to make the market more "structured" and "without

7455-456: The late 19th century. Wall Street became the symbol of a country and economic system that many Americans see as having developed through trade, capitalism, and innovation. The term "Wall Street" has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, the American financial services industry , or New York–based financial interests. Wall Street has become synonymous with financial interests, often used negatively. During

7560-473: The links immediately upon notice, a Shanghai court ruled in Shanda's favor in May 2011. In 2008, Shanda Interactive paid $ 80 million to acquire Mochi Media , an online game distributor in the United States. Shanda was the "largest online entertainment provider in China" by early 2009. That April the company reported that its MMORPG Aion had acquired 1 million paying users within four days of its release. In 2009,

7665-436: The locus of financial services dealings even by 1911. But as technology progressed, in the middle and later decades of the 20th century, computers and telecommunications replaced paper notifications, meaning that the close proximity requirement could be bypassed in more situations. Many financial firms found that they could move to Midtown Manhattan , only four miles (6 km) away, and still operate effectively. For example,

7770-402: The lower tip of the island. The Civil War greatly expanded the northern economy, bringing greater prosperity to cities like New York which "came into its own as the nation's banking center" connecting "Old World capital and New World ambition", according to one account. J. P. Morgan created giant trusts and John D. Rockefeller 's Standard Oil moved to New York City. Between 1860 and 1920,

7875-439: The manipulative auctions", with a commission structure. Persons signing the agreement agreed to charge each other a standard commission rate; persons not signing could still participate but would be charged a higher commission for dealing. In 1789, Wall Street was the scene of the United States' first presidential inauguration when George Washington took the oath of office on the balcony of Federal Hall on April 30, 1789. This

7980-463: The number and quality of financial jobs in the city. One estimate was that Wall Street firms employed close to 200,000 persons in 2008. Another estimate was that in 2007, the financial services industry which had a $ 70 billion profit became 22 percent of the city's revenue. Another estimate (in 2006) was that the financial services industry makes up 9% of the city's work force and 31% of the tax base. An additional estimate from 2007 by Steve Malanga of

8085-538: The number of stocks to get his Dow Jones average . Dow's numbers were a "convenient benchmark" for analyzing the market and became an accepted way to look at the entire stock market . In 1889 the original stock report, Customers' Afternoon Letter , became The Wall Street Journal . Named in reference to the actual street, it became an influential international daily business newspaper published in New York City. After October 7, 1896, it began publishing Dow's expanded list of stocks. A century later, there were 30 stocks in

8190-432: The origins of the name Wall Street appeared in modern times because in the 19th and early 20th century some historians mistakenly thought the Dutch had called it "de Waal Straat", which to Dutch ears sounds like Walloon Street. However, in 17th century New Amsterdam, de Waal Straat (Wharf or Dock Street) was a section of what is today's Pearl Street . The original wall was constructed under orders from Director General of

8295-505: The overall percent of actual users was most likely small. A reporter wrote: The Wall Street drug dealer looked like many other successful young female executives. Stylishly dressed and wearing designer sunglasses, she sat in her 1983 Chevrolet Camaro in a no-parking zone across the street from the Marine Midland Bank branch on lower Broadway. The customer in the passenger seat looked like a successful young businessman. But as

8400-428: The prior year. By the fall of 2011, Shanda Interactive offered MMORPGs, casual games, film, music, and literature on an "integrated service platform." With most of its audiences in China, the company had subsidiaries and affiliates such as Ku6 Media . Shanda Literature was renamed Cloudary in 2011, and that October the unit filed to go public in the United States with an IPO of about $ 200 million. By March 2012, Cloudary

8505-560: The public. Analyst Robert Kuttner in the Huffington Post criticized the bailout as helping large Wall Street firms such as Citigroup while neglecting to help smaller community development banks such as Chicago's ShoreBank . One writer in the Huffington Post looked at FBI statistics on robbery, fraud, and crime and concluded that Wall Street was the "most dangerous neighborhood in the United States" if one factored in

8610-469: The setbacks, the American economy was once more "bouncing back". What had happened during these heady years? Clark wrote: But the picture is too nuanced simply to dump all the responsibility on financiers. Most Wall Street banks didn't actually go around the US hawking dodgy mortgages; they bought and packaged loans from on-the-ground firms such as Countrywide Financial and New Century Financial, both of which hit

8715-607: The settlement "New York" and in tax records from April 1665 (still in Dutch) they refer to the street as Het Cingel ofte Stadt Wall ("the Belt or the City Wall"). This use of both names for the street also appears as late as 1691 on the Miller Plan of New York. New York Governor Thomas Dongan may have issued the first official designation of Wall Street in 1686, the same year he issued a new charter for New York. Confusion over

8820-478: The stone an inch or two [3–5 cm] and chipped off pieces ranging from three inches to a foot [8–30 cm] in diameter. The ornamental iron grill work protecting each window was broken or shattered. ... the Assay Office was a wreck. ... It was as though some gigantic force had overturned the building and then placed it upright again, leaving the framework uninjured but scrambling everything inside. The area

8925-404: The surrounding area lost 100,000 jobs according to one estimate. Since telecommunications costs were coming down, banks and brokerage firms could move away from the Financial District to more affordable locations. One of the firms looking to move away was the NYSE. In 1998, the NYSE and the city struck a $ 900 million deal which kept the NYSE from moving across the river to Jersey City ; the deal

9030-449: The trading floor alone, and 200 miles (320 km) of fiber-optic cable below ground. Finance professor Charles R. Geisst wrote that the exchange has become "inextricably intertwined into New York's economy". Wall Street pay, in terms of salaries and bonuses and taxes, is an important part of the economy of New York City , the tri-state metropolitan area , and the United States . Anchored by Wall Street, New York City has been called

9135-502: The wall encircled most of the city and had two large stone bastions on the northern side. The Dutch named these bastions "Hollandia" and "Zeelandia" after the ships that carried their invasion force. The wall started at Hanover Square on Pearl Street, which was the shoreline at that time, crossed the Indian path that the Dutch called Heeren Wegh , now called Broadway , and ended at the other shoreline (today's Trinity Place), where it took

9240-546: The works or city fortifications) were reinforced and expanded to protect against potential incursions from Native Americans , pirates, and the English. The English also expanded and improved the wall after their 1664 takeover (a cause of the Second Anglo-Dutch War ), as did the Dutch from 1673 to 1674 when they briefly retook the city during the Third Anglo-Dutch War , and by the late 1600s

9345-399: The world's most economically powerful city and leading financial center . As such, a falloff in Wall Street's economy could have "wrenching effects on the local and regional economies". In 2008, after a downturn in the stock market, the decline meant $ 18 billion less in taxable income, with less money available for "apartments, furniture, cars, clothing and services". Estimates vary about

9450-492: The world's principal fintech and financial center . The street was originally known in Dutch as Het Cingel ("the Belt") when it was part of New Amsterdam during the 17th century. An actual city wall existed on the street from 1653 to 1699. During the 18th century, the location served as a slave market and securities trading site , and from 1703 onward, the location of New York's city hall, which became Federal Hall . In

9555-623: The year prior. Shanda Interactive announced in February 2007 that the free-to-play model was proving lucrative, and shares increased 10 percent in value that day. Following Shanda's example, other Chinese online game operators began declaring many of their titles free to play. By 2007, most new games in China were using the freemium model. In July 2006, Motorola announced it would launch wireless versions of Shanda's games in China, with World of Legend and Magical Land to be playable on certain Motorola E680g handsets. By November 2006, Shanda

9660-572: Was "up 70% from a year earlier." Shanda purchased about 20% of Sina.com for $ 230 million in 2005, becoming Sina's largest shareholder. Operating as an online advertising firm, Sina.com was the most popular internet portal in China at the time. Also that year Shanda purchased the mobile game provider Digital-Red and the literature website Qidian . In 2005, Shanda also began working with search engine Baidu and partnered with Universal Music Group to support music streaming on PCs in China. Shanda revealed two hardware products in October 2005. The EZ mini

9765-485: Was a handheld wireless gaming device, while the EZ Center/EZ Pod software for was remote PC control. Shanda employed 2,000 game developers at its headquarters at the end of 2005, and had recently purchased motion-capture equipment to speed the animation process. With six game titles at the time, four of those had been developed in-house. On average, Shanda's revenues doubled each year between 2001 and 2005, and at

9870-510: Was also the location of the passing of the Bill of Rights . Alexander Hamilton , who was the first Treasury secretary and "architect of the early United States financial system", is buried in the cemetery of Trinity Church , as is Robert Fulton famed for his steamboats . In the first few decades, both residences and businesses occupied the area, but increasingly business predominated. "There are old stories of people's houses being surrounded by

9975-399: Was bought by JPMorgan Chase forced by the U.S. government , and Merrill Lynch was bought by Bank of America in a similar shot-gun wedding. These failures marked a catastrophic downsizing of Wall Street as the financial industry goes through restructuring and change. Since New York's financial industry provides almost one-fourth of all income produced in the city, and accounts for 10% of

10080-504: Was closed for weather-related reasons, the first time since Hurricane Gloria in September 1985 and the first two-day weather-related shutdown since the Blizzard of 1888 . Wall Street's architecture is generally rooted in the Gilded Age . The older skyscrapers often were built with elaborate facades, which have not been common in corporate architecture for decades. There are numerous landmarks on Wall Street, some of which were erected as

10185-527: Was described as the "largest in city history to prevent a corporation from leaving town". In 2001, the Big Board , as some termed the NYSE, was described as the world's "largest and most prestigious stock market". When the World Trade Center was destroyed on September 11, 2001 , the attacks "crippled" the communications network and destroyed many buildings in the Financial District, although

10290-492: Was expanding from online games into an "entertainment empire on the Internet, mobile phones and TVs," according to China Daily . Shanda sold 4 million shares of Sina Corp for $ 129 million in February 2007. In June 2007, Shanda Interactive signed licensing and distribution agreements to expand World of Legend , Magical Land and Crazy Kart into Vietnam , Hong Kong and Macao . In November 2007, Shanda Interactive purchased

10395-637: Was reduced four times before 1960, each time stimulating a mini-rally and boosting volume, and when the Federal Reserve reduced the margin requirements from 90% to 70%. These changes made it somewhat easier for investors to buy stocks on credit. The growing national economy and prosperity led to a recovery during the 1960s, with some down years during the early 1970s in the aftermath of the Vietnam War . Trading volumes climbed; in 1967, according to Time Magazine , volume hit 7.5 million shares

10500-469: Was safe" on Wall Street. A few days later, on October 24, stock values plummeted. The stock market crash of 1929 ushered in the Great Depression , in which a quarter of working people were unemployed, with soup kitchens, mass foreclosures of farms, and falling prices. During this era, development of the Financial District stagnated, and Wall Street "paid a heavy price" and "became something of

10605-674: Was second on the Hurun Report 's "rich list", was voted China Central Television 's "Rising Business Star", and was featured in MIT Technology Review ' s Innovators Under 35 list. Shanda Group went private in early 2012, with Chen, his wife, and his brother keeping a combined 57% stake. In 2015, Chen, as the beneficial owner of Shanda Asset Management, acquired over 80,127 hectares of land in Oregon from Fidelity National Financial for US$ 85 million, making him one of

10710-423: Was subjected to numerous threats; one bomb threat in 1921 led to detectives sealing off the area to "prevent a repetition of the Wall Street bomb explosion". September 1929 was the peak of the stock market. October 3, 1929, was when the market started to slip, and it continued throughout the week of October 14. In October 1929, renowned Yale economist Irving Fisher reassured worried investors that their "money

10815-405: Was that Wall Street provided a fourth of all personal income earned in the city, and 10% of New York City's tax revenue. The city's securities industry, enumerating 163,400 jobs in August 2013, continues to form the largest segment of the city's financial sector and an important economic engine, accounting in 2012 for 5 percent of private sector jobs in New York City, 8.5 percent (US$ 3.8 billion) of

10920-420: Was the largest Chinese online literature platform in 2008, with 20 million registered accounts. In 2009, Shanda Literature spurred controversy for promoting the popular writers Guo Jingming and vivibear , both accused of plagiarism. In 2010, Shanda Literature sued the search engine Baidu.com for providing links to pirated versions of Shanda Literature's copyrighted material. Agreeing that Baidu did not remove

11025-444: Was the largest online publishing platform in China, with 1.6 million authors and 6 million titles. Three years later, Cloudary was merged with Tencent Holdings . Shareholders of Shanda Interactive Entertainment voted "overwhelmingly" in February 2012 to accept a buyout from the company's three founders. Paying $ 740 million for about 25 percent of the shares, Chrissy Luo, Tianqiao Chen, and Danian Chen took Shanda Interactive private in

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