Figure skaters have toe picks. Gross foot enthusiasts have toe picks. Why shouldn't stock indexes have...topix?
In the U.S., the stock market gets measured by two major indexes. You've got the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average. They track the stock market in different ways. The S&P looks at 500 companies. The Dow looks at 30. The makers of the Dow try to choose 30 stocks that accurately reflect the overall economy. But the S&P has the broader scope.
In Japan, they've got a similar situation. The market gets tracked by two high-profile indexes: the Nikkei 225 and the Topix 30.
The Nikkei is the S&P 500 equivalent...broader in scope. The Topix acts like a Japanese version of the Dow...30 of the biggest stocks in the country, chosen to represent the overall economy.
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Finance: What is the S&P 500?45 Views
finance a la shmoop. what is the S&P 500? well the S&P 500 is just an index- that
is the standard and poors company assembled 500 stocks put them on a
spreadsheet- this was a spreadsheet in 1957 -and they tracked them. [spreadsheet pictured]
well the index had something like 37 shares of Procter & Gamble, the 23 shares
of Ford, 18 shares of IBM and so on. in the 1950s the S&P 500 totaled something
like 40 maybe 50 bucks on a good day. at the end of each day the elves who worked
inside of the S&P Factory, they would add up the shares basically ignore any
dividends and send to the press a total which was published to more or less
everyone who cared about investing. well not nearly even a century later the 40 [man reads newspaper]
to $50 reign to the SNP is today knock on the door of 2,500 .so without even
having dividends reinvested you'd have made 50 times your money with dividends
reinvested to buy more shares instead of keeping the cash to buy you know
groceries or electric massage slippers. you'd have made over 70 times your [grocery display case and slippers pictured]
original investment. welcome to America.
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