STI Index

The FTSE Straits Times Index (otherwise known as the STI) is the major blue-chip stock market index of the Singapore Exchange (SGX), and the benchmark index of the Singaporean economy more broadly. It has been calculated in one way or another since 1966, and today is managed and calculated jointly by the Singapore Exchange, FTSE Group, and Singapore Press Holdings (SPH).

This page will take you through a brief history of the STI, give information about how the 30 stocks it tracks are selected, and let you know how you can invest in the index’s performance.

The FTSE Straits Times Index’s history goes all the way back to 1966. It replaced the Straits Times Industrials Index (STII) in August of 1998, but continued from the same level the index had reached at that point (885.26 points). The reason for this change was a re-classification of the Singapore Exchange which resulted in the removal of the “industrials” category of stocks.

The STI then became the FTSE Straits Times Index in January of 2008, as a result of a new partnership between SGX, FTSE, and SPH. This partnership saw two major changes apart from the index’s name: the stocks the index tracked were reduced from 50 to 30, and the index adopted the methodology used to calculate the FTSE index.

The FTSE Straits Times Index has had a rather turbulent history, with many major spikes and crashes over time. The two most notable of these happened at the times at which the index changed its management or the way it was calculated. In August 1998, when the STII became the STI, the index dipped below 900 index points for the first time since February 1988. Similarly, in 2008, the global financial crash saw the index fall from its all-time high of 3875.77 on October 11th 2007 to 1,746.47 by 1st January 2009. The STI has recovered from this point, but never reached its October 2007 heights again.

There are 30 stocks tracked by the STI, and those selected are the top companies listed on the Singapore Exchange by market capitalisation and trading volume. Companies currently included in this list are Singapore Airlines, CapitaCom Trust, and Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp.