Infosys joins Nasdaq elite club

Mumbai, Dec. 9: Infosys Technologies today became the first ever Indian company to enter the Nasdaq-100 Index after successfully completing a third sponsored American Depository Shares (ADS) issue.

In doing so, the company joined the ranks of Google Inc, Yahoo and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries.

The Nasdaq-100 index represents companies across major industry groups such as computer hardware and software, telecommunications, retail/wholesale trade and biotechnology. It does not contain securities of financial companies, including investment firms.

To be eligible for initial inclusion in the index — a security must be listed on the Nasdaq and meet various criteria. Nasdaq has stipulated that the security’s US listing must be exclusively on the exchange, it must be of a non-financial company, the security may not be issued by an issuer currently in bankruptcy proceedings and the security must have average daily trading volume of at least 200,000 shares.

Nasdaq Stock Market announced the reshuffle in its Nasdaq-100 index by including Infosys, which was listed on the exchange seven years ago. The induction will be operational from December 18.

“We are delighted to hear the news, especially as we are celebrating our silver jubilee year,” said Infosys chief financial officer V. Balakrishnan.

Last month, Infosys announced the pricing of its sponsored secondary offering of three crore ADSs, representing three crore equity shares of $53.50 per ADS.