MSCI Index

Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) indexes are one of the most globally followed benchmarks of the stock markets. They include more than 80 countries from developed, emerging and frontier markets, covering 99% of investable opportunities. Indexes are weighted by market cap and created following the Global Industry Classification Standard (GICS). Created in 1968 it represents the first global market index.

Stocks included in MSCI are highly liquid. The market capitalization is denominated in dollars and local currency. They cover different geographic areas and categories. The most followed indexes are MSCI ACWI, MSCI World, MSCI EAFE, MSCI Emerging Markets, MSCI China, MSCI USA, MSCI Europe. Investors can choose from more than 190K indexes.

• MSCI ACWI stands for MSCI All Country World Index which is comprised of large and mid-cap stocks from 23 developed and 26 emerging countries. Total of 2.774 stocks accounting for 85% of all investable opportunities. It is the biggest selection of traded stocks in some index. As of June 2018, 53.64% are US stocks.
• MSCI World tracks the performance of 1649 companies through the world since 1969. It represents approx. 88% of MSCI ACWI.
• MSCI EAFE measures the performance of developed markets without the US and Canada. It stands for Europe, Australasia and the Far East. Total of 21 developed countries. When it was first introduced in 1969 the index consisted of 926 stocks. The index large-cap stocks account 70% of all. 71st to 85th percentiles are the mid-caps and the rest are small-cap stocks.
• MSCI Emerging Markets represent the performance of stocks in 26 countries across 5 regions. It has more than 1100 constituents. Emerging markets account for 13% of the global market capitalization. It was firstly introduced in 1988.

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