In 1860 the U.S. Congress arranged among the telegraph companies a competition to create a national line. The winner was Western Union. Another invention of Western Union - time synchronization. In 1995, First Financial Management was acquired by First Data Corp. (the deal amounted to $ 7 billion), and Western Union Financial Services became a subsidiary of First Data. 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). In October 2006 the company made an initial public offering of shares on the New York Stock Exchange, becoming independent from First Data company. The Western Union Company is a leader in global payment services One of the common kinds of money transfer is a transfer via the international system of Western Union. Transaction with Fexco has allowed Western Union to control directly more than 10 thousand points of service, which belonged to Fexco in 7 European countries (Spain, UK, Sweden, Ireland, Denmark, Norway and Finland). Western Union made so that the time in all of American civil services was the same.