Sensex closed at an all time high of 15,039 last evening. We present to you a timeline of the Sensex story since it’s inception.

Established in 1875 as “The Native Share & Stock Brokers Association”, Bombay Stock Exchange is India’s first stock exchange to obtain permanent recognition in 1956 from the Government of India under the Securities Contracts (Regulation) Act, 1956. Since 2005 BSE (earlier an Association of Persons) is a demutualised and corporatised entity incorporated under the provisions of the Indian Companies Act, 1956 and is now called the Bombay Stock Exchange Limited.

The bench mark index on the BSE is Sensex and is tracked worldwide. Sensex, the Sensitivity Index, is a basket of 30 constituent stocks representing large and liquid companies. First compiled in 1986 was calculated on a “Market Capitalization-Weighted” methodology. Now it’s the “Free-Float Market Capitalization-Weighted” method being used wherein the level of index indicates the Free-float market value of 30 stocks comprised in the basket relative to a base period. The base year of Sensex is 1978-79 and the base value is 100.

Lets have a look at the journey of Sensex from 1000 to 15,000 points (Source: www.rediff.com)

Analysts in India, including the big brokers feel that Sensex will cross 25,000 mark by 2010, a figure which was well predicted in 2005 itself. Morgan Stanley bank predicts its surge to 50,000 in 2020 and this seems quite possible with Brazil’s Sao Paulo Stock Exchange’s benchmark index Bovespa hitting 50,000 mark first time ever on May 3rd this year.

BSE in the picture above (source: www.india-picture.com) is located on the Dalal street in Mumbai. Dalal in Hindi means a broker.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 10th, 2007 at 4:20 pm and is filed under Investment, Economy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.