NEW YORK, Dec. 14, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Nasdaq (Nasdaq: NDAQ) today announ­ced the results of the annu­al re-ran­king of the NASDAQ-100 Index® (Nasdaq:NDX), which will beco­me effec­ti­ve pri­or to mar­ket open on Mon­day, Decem­ber 24, 2018.

The fol­lo­wing six com­pa­nies will be added to the Index: Advan­ced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD), lulu­le­mon ath­le­ti­ca inc. (LULU), Net­App, Inc. (NTAP), United Con­ti­nen­tal Hol­dings, Inc. (UAL), Veri­Sign, Inc. (VRSN) and Wil­lis Towers Wat­son Public Limi­t­ed Com­pa­ny (WLTW).

The NASDAQ-100 Index is com­po­sed of the 100 lar­gest non-finan­cial com­pa­nies lis­ted on The NASDAQ Stock Mar­ket^® and dates to Janu­ary 1985 when it was laun­ched along with the NASDAQ Finan­cial-100 Index^®, which is com­pri­sed of the 100 lar­gest finan­cial stocks on NASDAQ^®. The­se inde­xes act as bench­marks for finan­cial pro­ducts such as opti­ons, futures, and funds. The NASDAQ-100 is re-ran­ked each year in Decem­ber, timed to coin­ci­de with the qua­dru­ple witch expi­ra­ti­on Fri­day of the quarter.

On a cumu­la­ti­ve pri­ce return basis, the NASDAQ-100 Index has retur­ned almost 5,459.21% sin­ce incep­ti­on, alt­hough past per­for­mance is not indi­ca­ti­ve of future performance.

The NASDAQ-100 Index is the basis of the Power­Sha­res QQQ Trust (QQQ) which aims to pro­vi­de invest­ment results that, befo­re expen­ses, cor­re­spond with the NASDAQ-100 Index per­for­mance. In addi­ti­on, opti­ons, futures and struc­tu­red pro­ducts based on the NASDAQ-100 Index and the Power­Sha­res QQQ Trust trade on various exchanges.

As a result of the re-ran­king, the fol­lo­wing six com­pa­nies will be remo­ved from the Index: Express Scripts Hol­ding Com­pa­ny (ESRX), Holo­gic, Inc. (HOLX), Qura­te Retail, Inc. (QRTEA), Shire plc (SHPG), Sea­gate Tech­no­lo­gy PLC (STX) and Voda­fone Group Plc (VOD).

About Nasdaq Glo­bal Indexes
Nasdaq Glo­bal Inde­xes has been crea­ting inno­va­ti­ve, mar­ket-lea­ding, trans­pa­rent inde­xes sin­ce 1971. Today, our index offe­ring spans geo­gra­phies and asset clas­ses and includes diver­se fami­lies such as the Divi­dend and Inco­me (includes Divi­dend Achie­vers), Dor­sey Wright, Fixed Inco­me (includes Bul­letSha­res®), Glo­bal Equi­ty, Green Eco­no­my, Nor­dic and Com­mo­di­ty inde­xes. We con­ti­nuous­ly offer new oppor­tu­ni­ties for finan­cial pro­duct spon­sors across a wide-spec­trum of investa­ble pro­ducts and for asset mana­gers to mea­su­re risk and per­for­mance. Nasdaq also pro­vi­des exch­an­ge lis­ting, cus­tom index and design solu­ti­ons to finan­cial orga­niza­ti­ons worldwide.

About Nasdaq
Nasdaq (NDAQ) is a lea­ding glo­bal pro­vi­der of tra­ding, clea­ring, exch­an­ge tech­no­lo­gy, lis­ting, infor­ma­ti­on and public com­pa­ny ser­vices. Through its diver­se port­fo­lio of solu­ti­ons, Nasdaq enables cus­to­mers to plan, opti­mi­ze and exe­cu­te their busi­ness visi­on with con­fi­dence, using pro­ven tech­no­lo­gies that pro­vi­de trans­pa­ren­cy and insight for navi­ga­ting today’s glo­bal capi­tal mar­kets. As the crea­tor of the world’s first elec­tro­nic stock mar­ket, its tech­no­lo­gy powers more than 100 mar­ket­places in 50 count­ries, and 1 in 10 of the world’s secu­ri­ties tran­sac­tions. Nasdaq is home to over 4,000 total lis­tings with a mar­ket value of appro­xi­m­ate­ly $15 tril­li­on. To learn more, visit business.nasdaq.com.

The infor­ma­ti­on con­tai­ned abo­ve is pro­vi­ded for infor­ma­tio­nal and edu­ca­tio­nal pur­po­ses only, and not­hing con­tai­ned her­ein should be con­strued as invest­ment advice, eit­her on behalf of a par­ti­cu­lar finan­cial pro­duct or an over­all invest­ment stra­tegy. Neither The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc. nor any of its affi­lia­tes makes any recom­men­da­ti­on to buy or sell any finan­cial pro­duct or any repre­sen­ta­ti­on about the finan­cial con­di­ti­on of any com­pa­ny or fund. State­ments regar­ding Nasdaq’s pro­prie­ta­ry inde­xes are not gua­ran­tees of future per­for­mance. Actu­al results may dif­fer mate­ri­al­ly from tho­se expres­sed or impli­ed. Past per­for­mance is not indi­ca­ti­ve of future results. Inves­tors should under­ta­ke their own due dili­gence and careful­ly eva­lua­te com­pa­nies befo­re inves­t­ing. ADVICE FROM A SECURITIES PROFESSIONAL IS STRONGLY ADVISED.

Com­pa­ny Briefs:
The fol­lo­wing is brief infor­ma­ti­on about the five com­pa­nies to be added to the NASDAQ-100 Index. 

Advan­ced Micro Devices, Inc. ope­ra­tes as a semi­con­duc­tor com­pa­ny worldwide.

lulu­le­mon ath­le­ti­ca inc., an ath­le­tic appa­rel com­pa­ny, tog­e­ther with its sub­si­dia­ries, designs, dis­tri­bu­tes, and retails ath­le­tic appa­rel and access­ories for women, men, and fema­le youth.