The market capitalisation of the companies on the S&P 500 varies dramatically. Market capitalisation is the combined value of a company’s outstanding shares.
To be a part of the index, a company has to meet certain requirements. What companies are on the S&P 500?Īs its name suggests, the S&P 500 is comprised of 500 companies. If the index is increasing in value, that generally means the economy is doing well and vice versa.
The S&P 500 is also used to gauge how the US economy is doing. That means they can use the index and compare it to their own investment portfolio to see how well their stocks have performed. The S&P 500 is generally used as a benchmark figure by investors. The S&P 500 is a stock index that tracks 500 of the largest, publicly-traded companies in the US.