LONDON, Feb. 12, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- S&P Dow Jones Indices announced today the launch of the S&P Europe 350 Equal Weight Index (EWI) which is designed to equally measure the performance of the 350 leading, blue chip companies that comprise the widely followed S&P Europe 350®. The S&P Europe 350 is an equity index drawn from 17 major European markets and intends to provide investors with a tradable and easily replicable snapshot of investable Europe.

"Despite its simplicity, equal-weighting remains one of the most popular forms of alternative weighting," says Michael Orzano, associate director of global equity indices at S&P Dow Jones Indices. "The S&P Europe 350 EWI allows investors to measure the European equity markets while substantially reducing the contribution of the largest companies."

Earlier this month, S&P Dow Jones Indices announced the launch of the S&P Europe 350 Low Volatility High Dividend Index which is designed to calculate the performance of 50 high-yielding companies within the S&P Europe 350. Both indices were developed in response to the market's growing demand for non-market capitalization weighted versions of the S&P Europe 350. 

The S&P Europe 350 offers investors a benchmark that contains the largest and most liquid stocks from the European markets.  The 350 stocks have been selected on the basis of their size, liquidity, sector representation and country representation.

For more information, please visit: www.spdji.com.

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S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC, a part of McGraw Hill Financial, is the world's largest, global resource for index-based concepts, data and research. Home to iconic financial market indicators, such as the S&P 500® and the Dow Jones Industrial Average™, S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC has over 115 years of experience constructing innovative and transparent solutions that fulfill the needs of investors. More assets are invested in products based upon our indices than any other provider in the world. With over 1,000,000 indices covering a wide range of asset classes across the globe, S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC defines the way investors measure and trade the markets. To learn more about our company, please visit www.spdji.com. 

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SOURCE S&P Dow Jones Indices