The NIKKEI is the most well-known stock market index in Japan. It is named after the Nihon Keizai Shimbun (Nikkei), the company that publishes the newspaper of the same name and created the index in 1949.
The NIKKEI is a price-weighted index, which means that the value of the index is calculated based on the prices of the stocks it tracks, rather than their market capitalisations. The index is made up of 225 stocks that are listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE), and it is meant to represent a broad range of industries, including financials, industrials, technology, and consumer goods.
The NIKKEI is considered to be a leading indicator of the Japanese stock market, and it is often used as a barometer for the overall performance of the economy. However, because it only tracks 225 stocks, it is not considered to be a comprehensive measure of the market, and many investors and analysts use other indexes, such as the TSE’s Topix index or the MSCI Japan index, to get a more complete picture of the market.
In addition to the NIKKEI 225 index, Nikkei also publishes a number of other stock market indexes, such as the NIKKEI 400, which tracks the performance of mid-sized companies in Japan, and the NIKKEI Dividend Index, which tracks the performance of companies that have a history of paying dividends. These indexes provide a more nuanced view of the Japanese stock market and can be useful for investors with specific investment strategies.