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Market value (market capitalisation)
The share price times the number of shares: what the market says the whole company is worth.
A company with 500 million shares at R100 each has a market value of R50 billion. It is how indexes rank companies by size.
Market value changes every time the share price does. It is not the same as what the company would sell for, which usually includes a premium for control.
More terms
- Price to earnings (P/E)The share price divided by the profit per share: how many years of today’s profit you pay for.
- Dividend yieldThe dividends paid over the last year as a percentage of today’s share price.
- Ex-dividend dateThe first day a share trades without its next dividend.
- Payout ratioThe share of its profit a company pays out as dividends.
- IndexOne number that tracks a basket of shares, so you can see how a whole market or sector is doing.
- RebalancingResetting an index’s members and weights on a fixed timetable.
- Every term ↗
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