BSE celebrates 30 years of Sensex

Leading stock exchange BSE on Friday celebrated 30 years of market bellwether Sensex at a function held here. BSE Managing Director and Chief Executive Ashishkumar Chauhan said the 30-share benchmark has become part and parcel of the nation’s life and reflects the economic activities and the way the country is moving. The S&P BSE Sensex, launched on January 1, 1986, by the then Bombay Stock Exchange, the world’s largest exchange in terms of number of companies listed (over 7,800), represents about 45 per cent of the nation’s market by value. On the launch day, the index closed at 549.43 points. It scaled lifetime high of 30,024.74 points intra-day on March 4, 2015, while the closing high was 29,380.73 on the same day. The term ‘Sensex’ or the ‘sensitive index’ was coined by the Pune-based stock market analyst Deepak Mohoni. Tracing the Sensex’s journey, Asia Index Chief Executive Alka Banerjee said along with economic growth, markets have changed rapidly. “We have seen a big shift in how people save and invest. There has been real attitude change towards investment in securities. We knew this change would happen, as it is natural part of economic growth,” she said. The Sensex has seen 7,203 trading days since its launch till June 30, 2016. There were 3,768 up days and 3,434 down days for the index, as per the data provided by BSE, Asia’s oldest exchange.