Indices Trading Details

Indices

Trade on a host of the world’s leading indices such as UK 100, which features the top 100 most highly capitalised companies in the UK. You can also trade other indices such as the USA100 and the Shanghai Composite.

In its most regularly traded format, an index is defined as a portfolio of stocks that represents a particular market or market sector. Most major economies as well as developing economies have at least one financial index.

For instance, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), one of the most frequently used indices worldwide – is comprised of stocks from 30 of the largest companies in the US, representing approximately 25% of the US market. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 index is comprised of 500 of the most widely traded companies in the US, and represents approximately 70% of the total financial value of the US stock markets. As the S&P 500 is more diverse than the DJIA, it can give a better representation of the condition of US stock market as a whole.
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The value of an index is usually described in terms of a number of points. Each index is calculated in a slightly different way, but its value generally represents a weighted average of the current values of its component stocks. This means that the changing value of an index from one day to the next reflects the fluctuating values of the individual stocks that it is made up of, and is why an index can be a good representation of the state of a country’s economy or of a specific industry.
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To trade indices, traders can go long on a particular index if they believe that stocks in that market are likely to increase overall in the future, or go short on an index if they predict that the index is likely to drop in value.

Some widely traded indices includes:

The S&P 500 and Dow Jones (New York City)

The FTSE100 (London)

The DAX30 (Frankfurt)

The Hang Seng (Hong Kong)

The Nikkei225 (Tokyo)

The Shanghai Composite