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India's weightage in MSCI index up

Global equity index compiler Morgan Stanley Capital International has raised India's weightage in its MSCI Asia-Pacific Ex-Japan index to 3.14 per cent from 3.12 per cent, an MSCI official said on Friday.

India's weightage in the compiler's emerging markets index has also risen -- to 4.25 per cent from 4.21 per cent, the Hong Kong-based official said.

The company decided on these changes at its quarterly review of global indices on Thursday, he said.

Global portfolio managers use MSCI indices as a guide while allocating money to different countries.

All changes to MSCI's indices will be effective as of the close of trade on November 29, according to a press release on the MSCI Web site www.msci.com.

MSCI has also dropped mid-sized communications software firm Hughes Software Systems from the MSCI India index, the release said.

The official said the weightage of Hero Honda Motors Ltd in the India index has risen to 0.08 per cent from 0.05 per cent and that of ICICI Bank has gone up to 0.23 per cent from 0.2 per cent.

Market sources said that the weightage of consumer goods giant Hindustan Lever Ltd had risen the most, but the MSCI official could not confirm that.

Hindustan Lever recently raised the limit on foreign fund holding to 49 per cent from the earlier 24 per cent.

Last year, MSCI moved to benchmarks based on free float -- which reflect the number of shares in each market that are freely available for trade -- from those based on market capitalisation.

India's weightage in MSCI indices had gone down as a result, prompting some offshore funds to pare their exposures to Indian equities.

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