The Western Union Company - the American company, specialising on granting of services of monetary intermediary. Western Union was founded in 1851. The company is one of leaders in the market of the international remittances. Leaving the idea of expansion into Europe, Western Union took up the expansion of services in the U.S. market. Another invention of Western Union - time synchronization. In the early 60s Western Union has put into operation transcontinental microwave system of data transmission via radio waves, completely replacing the web of telegraph poles and wires. Separation of the companies had two objectives: first, to give Western Union the opportunity to develop more intensively, and secondly, to help First Data to return to its original activity (in 1992 the company separated from the payment system of American Express as an independent financial services company). July 3, 1884 the company's shares were included in the calculation base for the newly created stock index Dow Jones Transportation Average. You do not need to open a bank account, so you can send or receive money in any of the 170 000 service points of Western Union around the world. Western Union incomes for 2007 have made $4,9 billion US dollars, and the quantity of transactions has made 572 million. Thanks to cooperation with Western Union the Associated Press at the end of the XIX century took almost monopolistic position in the U.S. market news. On the market was placed about 765 million of ordinary shares of the company. On the first day trading on the exchange the company's shares rose by 3.3% and the cost was $ 19.96.