Sharon Bowen becomes first Black woman to chair NYSE board

[NEW YORK] Sharon Bowen was named on Monday as chair of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), its parent company announced, becoming the first Black woman to hold the role at the Wall Street fixture.

Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) also announced the President of its Fixed Income and Data Services division, Lynn Martin, will take over as NYSE president from Stacey Cunningham, who will join the exchange's board of directors.

"As organisations everywhere adjust to a world transformed by the pandemic, our management team is evolving along with the market environment," ICE founder Jeff Sprecher said in a letter announcing the changes.

Bowen, who is already a member of the boards of ICE and the NYSE, served from 2014 to 2017 as a commissioner at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission overseeing futures markets.

In 2010, then-president Barack Obama named her to a vice-chair of the body regulating US broker-dealers, the Securities Investor Protection Corporation.

Bowen also worked for three decades as a partner and associate in law firms, specialising in business law.

With 2,400 listed companies and a combined capitalisation of US$36 trillion, the NYSE, located in New York's Lower Manhattan business district, bills itself as the world's largest stock exchange.

In 2013, ICE acquired the NYSE Euronext Group, which was created by the merger of the American and European stock exchanges, for US$8.2 billion.

AFP