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Indexes are usually weighted for the market capitalisation of the shares which it includes. Thus a share with a massive market capitalisation like Naspers which is worth R1,35 trillion will have a much greater impact than a share with a smaller market capitalisation like Bidvest which is worth R45,5bn. The JSE/FTSE indexes are also restricted by their free-float. Some shares which have very large market capitalisations have a very small free-float - which means that they have less of an impact on indexes. A few indexes, like the Dow Jones Industrial Average, are not weighted at all but are simply an average of the share prices of the companies which they include.

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