Over the last couple of years the NASDAQ Exchange has lunched a big number of different indices that cover not just NASDAQ market and US economy, but characterize the different markets all over the globe.
The same as before the NASDAQ 100 and NASDAQ Composite indexes are the most popular indexes from this group. The NASDAQ Biotechnology and other older indexes are popular as well. Lately due to the financial situation on the US market, such indexes as NASDAQ 100 Financial, NASDAQ Bank and NASDAQ Other Financial indexes have become widely analyzed as well.
Shortly about NASDAQ Indexes.
The NASDAQ Composite index comprises the public companies traded on the NASDAQ Exchange.
The
NASDAQ 100 index includes biggest non financial domestic and international publicly traded companies on the NASDAQ Exchange. As an opposite, the NASDAQ 100 Financial index covers 100 biggest financial companies.
From the name, you may guess that the NASDAQ Biotechnology is based on the biggest companies from the biotechnology and pharmaceuticals industries. At the current moment this index is based on almost 150 companies.
With many NASDAQ indexes you may find the pair of each index. For instance the
NASDAQ 100 Index and NASDAQ 100 Equal Weighted indexes are comprised of the same stocks. The only difference between them is the selected method of calculation of the index value.
Among NASDAQ indexes you may find the indexes that cover following market sectors: Industrial, Insurance, Computer, Financial, Banks, Health Care, Telecommunications, Biotechnology, Technology, Ex-Technology, NeuroInsights and Neurotech, Internet.
Such indexes as NASDAQ China Index, NASDAQ-Canada Index and NASDAQ Israel Index cover non US markets.
At the same time you may find a row of indexes that covers domestic and international companies that are traded not just on US market but all over the world. As an example the NASDAQ OMX 100 index is comprised of the companies traded on the US market as well as on the European markets.
As you may see the wide range of indexes allows NASDAQ to cover sentiment in each market sector, by delivering to consumer the complete picture not just a US economy but describe sentiment in Canadian, China, Israel economies as well as monitor the health of the economy of Europe.
At the current moment more and more public companies are moving out from the floor trading into over the counter (computerized) trading and importance of the NASDAQ indexes is growing. Even if you are not involved in the index trading, it is recommended before starting stock or
options trading, to consider doing at least a brief analysis of the market sector chosen for trading stocks belong to and the NASDAQ indexes can become very handy here.
