FTSE and NYSE index charts going back 30 years?

[Kevingr]

Hi,

Does anyone have a link to historical UK and US stockmarket index
charts - going back decades. I did some googling but found nothing
appropriate.

Ta,

K

 

[Bruce Robson]

There's some on the FT site.
http://mwprices.ft.com/custom/ft-com/quotechartnews.asp

I've been playing with FT's charting. A better start point is
http://mwprices.ft.com/custom/ft-com/interactivecharting.asp

Where is says "Enter symbol* or company name" you can enter
DJIA - Dow Jones Industrial Index (data goes back to 1970)
NASDAQ - NASDAQ Index (data goes back to 1974)

I also tried FTSE and S&P500. FTSE gave me a list of FTSE indexes
to choose between. S&P500 gave me a list mainly of funds that
invest/track the S&P500 index.

This page allows you to plot your choosen "share" against various
indexes. However the index data is limited
CAC40 - starts 1989
DAX - starts 1996
FTSE100 - starts 1988
FTSE All share - starts 1993

Does anyone know when the various indexes started ?

Bruce

 

[Daytona]

Does anyone have a link to historical UK and US stockmarket index
charts - going back decades.

S&P500 back to 1871 here - http://www.econ.yale.edu/~shiller/data/ie_data.xls

Daytona

 

[Chris Game]

Daytona said:

S&P500 back to 1871 here - http://www.econ.yale.edu/~shiller/data/ie_data.xls

Related query - are there any sources (books?) that give price
comparisons back to the 18th Century? Someone from English Heritage
told me that one has to multiply by 600 to get from 1750 prices to
the present day, but that seems a little extreme, particularly for
land.

 

[Tim]

Someone from English Heritage
told me that one has to multiply by 600 to get from 1750 prices to
the present day, but that seems a little extreme, particularly for
land.

A factor of 600 would be equivalent to inflation of (say) around 2% per
annum for 200 years then 5% per annum for 50 years.
[Probably realistic for the last 50 years; I'm unclear on average inflation
much before this!!]

 

[Stephen Burke]

Related query - are there any sources (books?) that give price
comparisons back to the 18th Century? Someone from English Heritage
told me that one has to multiply by 600 to get from 1750 prices to
the present day, but that seems a little extreme, particularly for
land.

It's hard to compare prices except for basic things like bread. A factor 600
would make a farthing worth about 60p now, which sounds a bit much to me, but
maybe not too far out, say a penny for a pint of beer. There wasn't much
inflation until the last hundred years or so. Land prices are very hard to
compare, agricultural land isn't worth much now but was the main source of
wealth in 1750.

 

[Daytona]

Related query - are there any sources (books?) that give price
comparisons back to the 18th Century? Someone from English Heritage
told me that one has to multiply by 600 to get from 1750 prices to
the present day, but that seems a little extreme, particularly for
land.

Robert Beckmans 'The Downwave' attempts to use historical data to prove his
theories on economic cycles and has many references & graphs of basic
commodities, for instance since Stephen mentioned bread; the price of wheat
during the 18th Century was between 20-140 averaging at about 40 in 1700,
dropping to 30 in 1750 and ending the century at about 90. All units are
shillings per Winchester quarter - doing a search on that gives some more
sources of historical data which could act as a starting point -
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=wh...&ie=ISO-8859-1&hl=en&btnG=Google+Search&meta=

Land was £22/acre in 1770 and £1425 in 1979 (the latest figure on the chart)
inflation adjusted figures are £42 for 1770 & £1400 for 1979.

There's a large bibliography in the book, some sources for other historic price
charts mentioned which may be worth investigating -
Prof. Joseph Kitchin
Peter Aston
Prof. Joseph Schumpeter
Kondratieff
Jugler
Kitchin
Edwin Dewey
Prof W L Crumm

hth

Daytona

 

[Chris Game]

Daytona said:

Robert Beckmans 'The Downwave' ...

Thanks, I read that a while ago but it's a useful reminder and
there's usually a copy in the public library - strangely it doesn't
get taken out much!

I think the difficulty is in getting some picture that applies to
life as lived then; was land for instance less valuable then as it
was a less productive asset, or is it relatively less valuable now
because we don't need so much of it?

And what were housing rents in the 18thC.? I suppose literature might
give a clue...?

 

[Terry Harper]

And what were housing rents in the 18thC.? I suppose literature might
give a clue...?

Try Charles Dickens, and Mr Micawber's rent.

Wrong century, of course.

 

[Stephen Burke]

I think the difficulty is in getting some picture that applies to
life as lived then; was land for instance less valuable then as it
was a less productive asset, or is it relatively less valuable now
because we don't need so much of it?

You can start from the fact that hardly anything we can buy now even
existed then, and a lot of things that we now buy wouldn't have been bought
with money, e.g. a lot of people kept animals, made their own food and
furniture etc, and bartered for other things. Anything which needed to be
transported any distance cost a lot more, and exotic things like spices were
extremely expensive.

You also have to ask what your basic normalisation is going to be. It used
to take pretty much full time labour by the majority of the population to grow
enough food, whereas now agriculture is something like 4% of GDP and would be
quite a bit lower if we had a free market. With mechanised farms the labour
cost of growing wheat, say, is tiny. If you want comparability in those terms
you'd need to look at something like hand-made furniture (although even there
people use power tools). There's also the question of quality, I doubt that
people now would pay anything at all for C18 peasant-grade food.

And what were housing rents in the 18thC.? I suppose literature might
give a clue...?

ISTR Jane Austen's books have comments about incomes, although for the
wealthier end of society.

 

[Chris Game]

Stephen Burke said:

If you want comparability in those terms
you'd need to look at something like hand-made furniture ...

Nostell Priory have good records of the prices charged by Thomas
Chippendale for the furniture he supplied to the house in the 18thC.
One of the best examples is a huge desk/library table which cost
UKP70 in 1770 or thereabouts - this is one of the reasons for
doubting the 600 multiplier I mentioned before, 40KUKP deems too much
in today's money, leaving aside any rarity/heritage premium.