Barclays Global Investors says it has published a comprehensive guide to the world’s major indices. The guide, called the Index Atlas, is available as a book and on the internet.
“The investors’ understanding of their chosen benchmark is absolutely critical given the profusion of indices now available,” says Chris Sutton, head of passive investment strategy at Barclays Global Investors Europe. As well as helping investors choose a benchmark, the atlas also caters for the growing investor demand for investment tools, he says.
The Index Atlas gives information on more than 150 equity indices from around the world. It draws together snapshots of all the major indices enabling readers to make objective and quantitative comparisons between them, says BGI. Looking at indices by geographic region, the atlas discusses which elements to take into account when making a judgement.
In the book, each index covers one or two pages and the information is presented in tabular form. For each there is a standard list of descriptors which include geographic coverage, number of stocks, weighting method and eligibility.