what is the difference between a stock market and a stock exchange 
a stock exchange is a specific organization marketplace that facilitates equity trading for example the new york stock exchange and nasdaq a stock market is used as an umbrella term to refer to all of the stocks that trade in a particular country or region such as all of the companies that trade on both the new york stock exchange and the nasdaq the bottom linethe financial times stock exchange now known as the ftse russell group provides a variety of indices that track different segments of the u k financial markets its most popular index the ftse 100 tracks the top 100 companies by market cap in the united kingdom similarly to how the s p 500 works in the u s investors looking to gain exposure to these indices can invest in funds that track the indices such as the ishares core ftse 100 