TACOMA, Wash.--(Business Wire)--
Russell Investments has added companies in Vietnam to the Russell
Global Index for the first time. Nine Vietnamese firms qualified for
addition as a result of the annual reconstitution process and were
added to the global index as well as several sub-components such as
the Russell Emerging Markets Index, Russell Asia Index and Russell
Asia Pacific Index.
"The Russell Vietnam Index is an important addition to our
comprehensive family of global indexes," said Stephen Wood, senior
portfolio strategist for Russell. "The annual reconstitution process
captures the changing fortunes within key markets, such as this good
news in Vietnam, and recalibrates the indexes to accurately measure
current realities. This process gives investors truly representative
benchmarks to better gauge the performance of their stock portfolios
or retirement plans."
The nine additions are Corporation for Financing & Promoting
Technology, SaiGon Thuong Tin Commercial JSB, PetroVietnam Drilling &
Well Services JSC, Tan Tao Investment-Industry Corp., PetroVietnam
Fertilizer & Chemicals Corp., Vietnam Dairy Products JSC, PhaLai
Thermal Power JSC, Vincom JSC and Saigon Securities Inc.
Each of these companies also is included in the Russell Global
Small Cap Index. Three are in the materials and processing sector,
while six are designated as value companies and three as growth
companies.
Membership in Russell's equity indexes--widely used as benchmarks
for passive and active investment strategies--is determined by
objective rules, such as market capitalization rankings. Accurate
benchmarks are an integral part of Russell's ongoing process to
monitor more than 8,000 investment manager products worldwide for
Russell's $213 billion active investment management business.
Russell's U.S. indexes currently have $4.4 trillion in assets
benchmarked against them and account for an industry-leading 58.5% of
institutional benchmarked products.
The official list is available at
http://www.russell.com/Indexes/membership/Reconstitution/default.asp.
About Russell
Russell Investments provides strategic advice, world-class
implementation, state-of-the-art performance benchmarks and a range of
institutional-quality investment products. Russell has more than $213
billion in assets under management as of March 31, 2008, and serves
individual, institutional and advisor clients in more than 40
countries. Russell's industry-leading indexes have $4.4 trillion in
assets benchmarked to them as of Dec. 31, 2007. Founded in 1936,
Russell is a subsidiary of The Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance
Company.
Russell Investments
Steve Claiborne, 253-439-1858
newsroom@russell.com
Copyright Business Wire 2008
