U.S. Equity and Dividend Indexes

Named U.S. equity and dividend index pages used for broad-market, sector, and income-oriented benchmarking.

U.S. Equity and Dividend Indexes terms explain how benchmarks, market gauges, weighting rules, index families, data series, and market-cycle labels are used in investment analysis.

Use this branch when benchmark selection, index membership, weighting, float adjustment, publication source, region, sector, or dividend treatment changes the comparison being made.

Key Terms in This Branch

TermUse it for
Dow Jones Industrial AverageBenchmark construction, regional equity index, weighting, market-cycle, sentiment, commodity, freight, or index-publication terms.
Dow Jones U.S. Dividend 100 IndexBenchmark construction, regional equity index, weighting, market-cycle, sentiment, commodity, freight, or index-publication terms.
NASDAQ CompositeBenchmark construction, regional equity index, weighting, market-cycle, sentiment, commodity, freight, or index-publication terms.
S&P 500Benchmark construction, regional equity index, weighting, market-cycle, sentiment, commodity, freight, or index-publication terms.
S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats IndexBenchmark construction, regional equity index, weighting, market-cycle, sentiment, commodity, freight, or index-publication terms.
S&P 500 High Dividend IndexBenchmark construction, regional equity index, weighting, market-cycle, sentiment, commodity, freight, or index-publication terms.
Wilshire 5000Benchmark construction, regional equity index, weighting, market-cycle, sentiment, commodity, freight, or index-publication terms.

What to Check

Check the index provider, universe, eligibility rule, weighting method, float adjustment, rebalancing schedule, currency, dividend treatment, data date, and whether the index is investable or only a benchmark.

Common Mistakes

  • Treating an index as a recommendation or as a directly owned portfolio.
  • Comparing index returns without checking currency, dividends, fees, and time period.
  • Ignoring methodology changes, reconstitution, concentration, and float adjustments.
  • Using a regional or sector index as a broad-market benchmark without checking its universe.

Indexes are benchmarks and data tools, not personalized investment recommendations or performance promises.

In this section

Choose a subsection first. Deeper term pages live inside each subsection, which keeps large topic hubs readable.

Dow Jones Industrial Average

The Dow Jones Industrial Average tracks 30 selected U.S. blue-chip companies using share-price weights rather than company market values.

Dow Jones U.S. Dividend 100

The Dow Jones U.S. Dividend 100 Index selects 100 U.S. dividend stocks using yield eligibility and four fundamental rankings.

FT Wilshire 5000

The FT Wilshire 5000 is a float-adjusted index of eligible U.S. equities, used to measure the broad investable U.S. stock market.

Nasdaq Composite

The Nasdaq Composite tracks eligible domestic and international common-type stocks listed on Nasdaq using market-capitalization weights.

S&P 500

The S&P 500 tracks 500 leading U.S. large-cap companies using float-adjusted market-cap weights and is widely used as a U.S. equity benchmark.

S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats

The S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats Index equal-weights S&P 500 companies with long records of annual dividend increases.

S&P 500 High Dividend Index

The S&P 500 High Dividend Index equal-weights 80 higher-yielding S&P 500 companies selected by indicated annual dividend yield.

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