Question

For each of the following:

Briefly describe what it is.

Give the value of the index today (include the date in your answer.)

Briefly explain how the index has changed in the past month.

a, Dow Jones Industrial Average

b. Standard and Poor’s 500 Index

c. Nasdaq Composite Index

Answer 1

Dow Jones Industrial Average provides insight about stock performance of 30 large listed companies in US. It is among one of the oldest market indexes and its value is arrived through price weighted method. Ex : There are 30 co's with prices from x1 till x3.

Index Value = (x1+x2+x3...x30)/30

The index is ~3.2% positive since last month. Opening index value as on 31st Oct 2019 was 27188.37

Standard and Poor's 500 Index provides insight about stock performance of 500 large listed companies in US. It is among one of the most popular market indexes and its value is arrived through free float capitalization method.

Ex : There are 500 co's with prices from x1 till x500 and shares floating in the market from s1 till s500 respectively

Index Value = {(x1*s1)+(x2*s2)+...(x30*s30)}

The index is ~4.21% positive since last month. Opening index value as on 31st Oct 2019 was 3030.91

Nasdaq Composite Index is a comprehensive index that includes listed stocks and securities, alternate investment products like Real Estate Investment Trusts (REIT's), American Depository Receipts.  The index is ~4.93% positive since last month. Opening index value as on 31st Oct 2019 was 8314.38