Financial Market Statistics

Financial Market Statistics deals with the statistics from the financial market dealing with mainly the capital and money markets. The statistics cover the changes in the leading stock indices for a respective nation as well as the changes in the money markets, namely the changes in the interest rate for a specific country as well as the nature of inflation in the economy. Apart, from these two financial markets, the foreign exchange market, the derivatives market and the insurance market also come under the ambit of financial markets. Market Statistics covering changes in the foreign exchange markets depending on whether the country practices a fixed or floating exchange rate regime are also important as a tool for market analysis. For the latest data in the Indian scenario, a floating exchange rate is adopted which according to the latest statistics; the Indian rupee has increased to about Rs. 41 against the US dollar which lowering the country’s import prices but is also hitting the exporters hard.

In case of India, the two leading stock market indices are the Nifty and Sensex tracking the National Stock Exchange (NSE) and the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) respectively. The primary stock index for the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) is the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), that for the Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE) is the Nikkei and the primary index for the London Stock Exchange (LSE) is the FTSE (Financial Times Stock Exchange) 100 and the FTSE 250.

Some of the latest financial market statistics on the stock markets worldwide are :

DJIA

13,633.08 or up by 111.74 points or 0.83%

Standard and Poor (S&P) 500 Index

1,530.23 and unchanged

NASDAQ-100 Index

2592.59 or a rise of 20.53 points

Nikkei 225

17,875.75 or up by 287.49

BSE Sensex

14,411.38 or down by 96.83 points

NSE Nifty

4249.65 or down by 43.60 points

LSE FTSE 100

6639.0 or a rise of 36.90

The Indian central bank (Reserve Bank of India or RBI) is focusing on a tightening of its monetary policy with a view to keep the inflation at the target rate of under 4.5%. So the interest rates on the part of RBI have not risen on the face inflationary pressures and global macroeconomic situations. RBI in a move to stifle the inflation has raised the reverse repo rate, the repo rate and the bank rate which has surprised many economists around the country as higher inflation rates also spurred higher growth rates. The reverse repo rates were raised from 5.25% to 5.5% at the end of January 2007. Currently, the Bank Rates and Cash Reserve Ratio set by the RBI are nearing 6% and 5% respectively.

As per the figures of 2006, the rates set by central banks of other countries apart from India are :

US Federal Reserve

5.25%

Bank of England

4.50%

European Central Bank

2.75%

Bank of Japan

0.25%

Reserve Bank of Australia

5.75%

People’s Bank of China

5.85%

According to the Riskbank’s Financial Market Statistics for the country of Sweden, one of the most developed countries of the world also in terms of well-being, lending to households from housing credit institutions increased and with floating interest rates it increased the overall money supply for the economy by 12.3% in March 2007 and the interest rates to 3.96% with an increase of 0.06% compared to the previous month.