Publishing free float index through electronic trading system and website

On Sunday, June 8 th 2008, Amman Stock Exchange will start publishing the Stock Price index weighted by the free float market capitalization instead of the index weighted by market capitalization, through its electronic trading system, the ticker on the ASE website, the information dissemination screens and data vendors. The ASE has launched the free float index in July 2006 and the index is published in the daily bulletins and daily statistical summary and in the local mass media.

The CEO of the ASE, Jalil Tarif, said that the Free Float market capitalization weighted index approach has been adopted by many international stock exchanges and index providers institutions such as S&XP, FTSE Group, and Dow Jones Indexes and STOXX.

This index includes the same 100 listed companies at the ASE included in the index weighted by market capitalization. This index reflects the market performance, and it also decreases the effect of the big companies in terms of market capitalization on the index movement.

Besides, it gives a chance to small and medium companies to affect the index movement. 

The weight of each company in the new index is determined by the market capitalization of its free float shares and the weight of a single company is capped by up to (10%).

This Index is 1000 basic points value as at the end of year 1999, and it was daily calculated from the beginning of year 2000. Comparing the performance of the general index with other indices of the ASE reveals its harmony with these indices. Also, other main and sub sector indices, were calculated on daily basis for the same period. The constituents of this index are revised quarterly.

The ASE in corporation with Dow Jones indices launched (Dow Jones-ASE 100) and it is a wide index that tracks the performance of the largest 100 companies listed at the ASE and is weighted by Free-Float market capitalization. The ASE will adopt Dow Jones ASE 100 to become the official and only index, which will be published through media and the ASE bulletins.

It is worth mentioning that the ASE will continue publishing the price index weighted by market capitalization through its daily bulletins and daily statistics on the ASE website /market performance.

The free float market capitalization index stand at (4546) points or (23.7%) increase since the last year-end while the market capitalization weighted index stand at (9851) points, or (31%) since the last year-end.

* 5/6/2008 closing