Here at TheHabitStacker we love all things Habit, Finance, and Investing. That’s why we can’t wait to share another witty and satirical definition from Jason Zweig’s book, The Devil’s Financial Dictionary. If you’re an investor, you’ll enjoy this one, we almost guarantee it. Just be prepared to laugh and cry, all at once.
INDEX, n. Derived from the Latin for “forefinger,” a measure of the stock market, bond market, or other basket of financial assets that enables clients to point a finger at professional investors who can’t match its performance.
By extension the word index means a sign or guiding principle: the word indicate shares the same root. Among the earliest major financial indexes were the Dow Jones 11-stock average (later the Dow Jones Industrial Average) and the Standard Statistics Co. Composite (later the S&P 500 Index), dating to 1884 and 1923, respectively.
Jason ZWEIG
Financial Journalist