BSE Sensex Index

The Sensex is a stock index made up of large, liquid companies traded on the Mumbai-based BSE (formerly the Bombay Stock Exchange). Its name is short for the English phrase 'sensitive index'. The index began publication in 1986 and is calculated within the BSE group.

Constituents are weighted by their free-float shares and are spread across sectors such as banking, information technology, energy and consumer goods. With this structure, the BSE Sensex is a gauge that sums up the performance of India's established companies and is used as a benchmark by domestic and foreign investors. The other index playing a similar role in the country is the National Stock Exchange's NIFTY series. Only the freely floating shares of constituents are taken into account in the calculation.

Interest rate decisions by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), inflation, foreign portfolio flows and the path of the rupee are the main factors affecting the index. On Lzzo.com, the Sensex is shown in points using Yahoo Finance data; the index level is not a share price or a rupee amount.