Red Hat announced that announced that a European branch of the the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) has implemented its Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and Red Hat Network. NYSE Euronext is using RHEL for key components of its "mission-critical," high-speed financial trading environments, Red Hat said.

If you work around Linux regularly, in some ways the latest amazing news is… not that amazing. The New York Stock Exchange, where the world’s largest public companies trade their stocks, is now running on Linux. (Microsoft is not listed on the NYSE; they trade on the NASDAQ. Now *that* would have been a fun headline…) In addition the Chicago Mercantile Exchange also runs on Linux.

Red Hat started off on the NASDAQ in 1999 then moved to the NYSE in 2006. Two years later, the NYSE itself moved to Linux as the underlying operating system for trading operations. While financial services are a key vertical for Red Hat, it's not the only one.

Red Hat (NYSE:RHT) is trading 0.6% higher (up $0.12 to $20.96) today on volume of 250,516 shares. The stock has traded within a 52-week range of $7.50 and $23.72.

The London Stock Exchange will switch on the first module of its Linux and Unix-based trading platform in September, replacing existing Microsoft .Net architecture.

The London Stock Exchange has said its new Linux-based system is delivering world record networking speed, with 126 microsecond trading times. The news comes ahead a major Linux-based switchover in twelve days, during which the open source system will replace Microsoft .Net technology on the group's main stock exchange.

The London Stock Exchange has said its new open source-based trading system will save it at least £10 million annually, as well as driving new business.

The New Zealand Stock Exchange is moving to a Linux platform for its settlement and clearing system, replacing its existing HP NonStop platform and applications in order to reduce cost and increase flexibility.

NYSE adopts Red Hat Enterprise Linux for $140 billion-a-day trading platform.