In 1860 the U.S. Congress arranged among the telegraph companies a competition to create a national line. The winner was Western Union. 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 1877, starting from September, New York City residents began to have the opportunity to check the time on clock with the "time ball", located on the roof of constructed in the same year a new corporate headquarters - Western Union Building. Western Union incomes for 2007 have made $4,9 billion US dollars, and the quantity of transactions has made 572 million. In 2000 was launched the Web site westernunion.com, with which users from certain countries can independently transfer funds online. Number of active holders of "Golden Card" of Western Union amounted to 9.5 million people worldwide. Western Union for more than 130 years provides money transfer services to its customers.