PANews, January 10 - Matthew Sigel, head of digital asset research at VanEck, stated on the X platform that the fintech company Block is expected to become the first company in the S&P 500 to hold Bitcoin. For a stock to be included in the index, it must meet six main criteria: 1) Market capitalization exceeds $18 billion; 2) Public float exceeds 10%; 3) Earnings for the most recent quarter must be positive, and the total GAAP earnings for the previous four quarters must also be positive; 4) High liquidity; 5) Listed for at least 12 months; 6) Company headquarters are located in the United States.
Block met the last criterion (earnings) after the release of its Q1 2024 financial report. However, inclusion in the S&P 500 index does not strictly follow a formula but is rather at the discretion of the index committee. Historically, companies that meet all requirements have been included within 3 to 21 months (with LULU being an exception, taking 65 months).
Industry diversification is one of the factors considered by the index committee, which aims to maintain a sector composition that is generally consistent with the industry economy. The phrase 'consistent with the industry economy' is not clearly defined, so the S&P Total Market Index can be used as a reference: the financial industry currently accounts for 13.9% of the S&P 500, while it accounts for 14.6% in the broader index, indicating that there is still room for growth in the financial industry.