Sri Lankan stock market launches new index in collaboration with S&P

Sri Lanka develops new stock index

Sri Lanka’s Colombo Stock Exchange in collaboration with the Standard & Poor’s launched the ‘S&P Sri Lanka 20’ on Tuesday, a new index aimed at helping investors to measure the performance of the local market.

The new index which has been co-developed by S&P Indices and MCSI includes the largest 20 stocks traded in the Colombo Stock Exchange in terms of market capitalization.

Akal Banerjee, Vice President of Global Equity and Strategy Indices of S&P Indices said “S & P Sri Lanka 20 was created to help both local and international investors to gauge the performances of the Sri Lankan equity market”.

He also says in recent years, there has been increased interest in Sri Lankan equities from both domestic and international investors.

According to Banerjee, this spurred the demand for a Sri Lankan equity benchmark capable of supporting index linked financial products.

“I am confident that a credible and transparent index will positively impact the market” said Krishan Balendran, Chairman of the CSE.

The 20 stocks that will be included in this index needs to have a minimum float adjusted market capitalization of Rs. 500 million, a six month average daily traded value of Rs. 1 million and also should have traded 10 days of each month for the three months prior to the rebalancing reference date.

The firms also should have a positive net income over the 12 months prior to the rebalancing reference date.

John Keells Holdings PLC, Commercial Bank of Ceylon PLC, Bukit Darah PLC and Hatton National Bank PLC are some of the firms, which have been included in the latest index.