Graph the World

Graph: Largest Stock Exchanges in the World

2012-02-12T17:55:00.000+08:00

The largest stock exchanges in the world, by total market capitalization of firms listed on the exchange, is in the chart below.

Data Source: World Federation of Exchanges

Other than the top 7 exchanges, also mentioned in an earlier post, the next tier of exchanges include the following:
viii) TMX Group - This is the group of Canadian exchanges.
ix) BM&FBOVESPA - from Brazil
x) Australian SE

In terms of average market capitalization of firms listed, other notable exchanges are the Deutsche Borse (Germany), SIX Swiss Exchange, NASDAQ OMX Nordic Exchange, Johannesburg SE and MICEX (Russia).

Data Source: World Federation of Exchanges

Many of the stock exchanges cater largely to the listing of their domestic firms. There are a few exceptions in these notable categories:

A) Major exchanges, for example: NYSE Euronext (US) [22.5% foreign firms], NASDAQ OMX [11.1%], London SE Group [20.7%], NYSE Euronext (Europe) [12.9%]

B) Regional exchanges, for example: Johannesburg SE [12.2%], Singapore Exchange [40.2%, a large proportion catering to companies from China], Mexican Exchange [73.1%]

Data Source: World Federation of Exchanges

Check out a description of the top 14 stock exchanges here.

Data Source: World Federation of Exchanges; Graphs: Generated by me

Graph: Stock Exchanges of the World

2012-02-11T16:25:00.003+08:00

The following chart captures the market capitalization and number of listed firms on the world's stock exchanges.

Data Source: World Federation of Exchanges

From the chart, the largest or major stock exchanges in the world (as defined by total market capitalization and average market capitalization of firms listed on the exchange) are the following:

i) NYSE Euronext (US) - This is by far the largest stock exchange in the world in terms of total market capitalization (close to US$12 trillion) and average market capitalization (about US$5 billion). No other exchange comes close.
ii) NASDAQ OMX
iii) Tokyo SE Group
iv) London SE Group
v) NYSE Euronext (Europe)
vi) Shanghai SE
vii) Hong Kong Exchanges

See a subsequent post for further detailed data of the largest stock exchanges in the world.

Note that some exchanges belonging to the same company are classified separately, for example the NASDAQ exchanges (NASDAQ OMX and NASDAQ OMX Nordic Exchanges) and the NYSE Euronext Exchanges.

Data Source: World Federation of Exchanges; Graphs: Generated by me

Graph: The Largest Animals in The World

2012-02-10T11:28:00.001+08:00

This is a graph on a lighter topic - which are the largest animals in the world?

Data Source: Wikipedia

The largest animal (and mammal) in the world is the Blue Whale.
The largest fish is the Whale Shark.
The largest land animal (and land mammal) is the African Bush Elephant.
The largest reptile is the Saltwater Crocodile.
The largest snake is the Green Ananconda.
The largest lizard is the Komodo Dragon.
The largest bird is the Ostrich.
The largest amphibian is the Chinese Giant Salamander.

The Blue Whale is by far the largest, as you can see from the graph. Of course, other whales are of similar (though smaller) sizes.

More details on the largest animals can be found here.

Data Source: Wikipedia; Graph: Generated by me

Graph: World – Population and GDP by Country (Part 3)

2012-02-05T18:24:00.011+08:00

This graph continues from two earlier posts. It shows the top 15 countries by GDP per capita. These are essentially the dots that are clustered in the left part of the chart in Part 1.

Data Source: World Bank

You can see that the list is dominated by small / smallish countries (e.g. Monaco, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Bermuda, Norway, Switzerland, Denmark, Macau, Sweden and Ireland), but there are a notable number of large ones there too (e.g. United States and Canada).

See Part1 and Part 2 here.

Data Source: World Bank; Graph: Generated by me

Graph: World – Population and GDP by Country (Part 2)

2012-02-04T18:19:00.004+08:00

This graph is a continuation of an earlier post, showing the GDP and population by country, as well as the GDP per capita (which is the gradient of each data point). It zooms into the “2^nd tier” of countries (see the red box in the chart below).

Data Source: World Bank

This next chart zooms into the red box from the chart above.

Data Source: World Bank

Out of this 2^nd tier group highlighted, we can see 2 main groups:

a) 2^nd tier high-income group: This group consists of the next tier of rich and big European countries (France, UK, Italy, maybe Spain and Netherlands), Canada, Australia and South Korea. Their GDP per capita are all high, ranging from $20,000 to $47,000.

b) 2^nd tier middle-income group: This group consists of the next tier of large developing economies – Brazil, Russia, Mexico and Turkey. Their GDP per capita all hover around the world GDP per capita – ranging from $9,000 to $11,000. We can call this group the “BRMT” group, but I guess this acronym doesn’t sound as nice as “BRIC”.

See Part1 and Part 3 here.

Data Source: World Bank; Graph: Generated by me

Graph: World – Population and GDP by Country (Part 1)

2012-02-03T18:14:00.007+08:00

This graph shows the GDP and population by country, as well as the GDP per capita (which is the gradient of each data point). This is similar to an earlier post on Africa. It illustrates the largest economies in the world by GDP and population.

Data Source: World Bank

Some points of note:

a) US: The United States is still by far the largest economy in the world in terms of GDP, with a 2010 GDP of US$14.6 trillion. Its GDP per capita of $47,199 puts it at around 11^th in the world (see here).

b) EU: The EU, if it were a country, would have a larger GDP than the US – it has a combined GDP of U$16.2 trillion. However, its GDP per capita of $32,311 is much lower than the US.

c) China: China is now the 2^nd largest economy in the world in terms of GDP. Due to its large population, its GDP per capita (at $4,428) is around the median ($4,560).

d) Japan and Germany: Japan and Germany are the 3^rd and 4^th largest economies in the world.

e) India, Indonesia and Brazil: These are highlighted here as they are economies with large populations. India and Indonesia are still relatively low in their total GDP, as well as GDP per capita, which are below the median. Brazil, on the other hand, has a GDP per capita that is above the median. These are potential next tier of fast growing countries.

See Part 2 and Part 3 here.

Data Source: World Bank; Graph: Generated by me

Graph: Africa - GDP per capita

2012-02-02T09:46:00.059+08:00

From an earlier post, there are a number of African countries with GDP per capita higher than the mean (i.e. the countries above the mean line in the graph below) that we did not look at.

Data Source: World Bank

Zooming into these countries, we can see which of the African countries have the highest GDP per capita.

Data Source: World Bank

The economies of many of these countries are dominated by the oil & gas industry (e.g. Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Algeria, Angola, Republic of Congo) or natural resources (e.g. Namibia). Other countries rely on tourism (e.g. Seychelles, Mauritius), while others have more diversified economies (e.g. South Africa, Tunisia, Cape Verde). Many of these are also countries that have small populations (e.g. Seychelles: 87,000; Cape Verde: 0.5m; Mauritius: 1.3m; Gabon: 1.5m) or uncertain population numbers (e.g. Equatorial Guinea: 0.7m estimated, but other estimates range up to 1.2m).

Of course, these countries may also have high income disparities, so the poverty levels can still be quite high there.

Data Source: World Bank; Graphs: Generated by me; Country Sources: CIA – The World Factbook

Graph: Africa - GDP and Governance

2012-02-01T16:19:00.003+08:00

This graph shows the governance score for the top 20 African countries (by GDP). The scores range from around -2.5 to 2.5, with higher values corresponding to better governance.

Data Source: World Bank

We can see that the countries with scores close to or greater than zero are South Africa, Tunisia, Ghana, Botswana, Namibia and Mauritius. Coupled with the findings from a previous post on population, GDP and GDP per capita, it seems that only South Africa appears in both charts, i.e. having high population / GDP / GDP per capita, as well as having a good governance score. Further analysis could look at these countries with good governance scores and evaluate other parameters and hence their potential for profitable investments.

Data Source: World Bank; Graph: Generated by me

Graph: Africa – Population and GDP

2012-01-29T00:01:00.005+08:00

This graph shows the GDP and population of the African countries, as well as the GDP per capita (which is the gradient of each data point).

Data Source: World Bank

The chart might be useful in terms of thinking about which African countries are doing well economically to invest in – High GDP implies a strong economy; High Population implies a potential large domestic market; High GDP per capita implies a high spending power of the population (assuming the income gap is not too high, which may not be the case).

On these counts, South Africa, Egypt, Algeria, Nigeria, Angola and Morocco could be potential countries for investors to take another look at. Of course, there is the issue of corporate governance or political stability, which would be looked at in a subsequent post.

South Africa’s 2010 GDP (US$364bn) places it as the top African country with the highest GDP, but the 28^th country in the world. In terms of GDP per capita, South Africa (US$7,275) is ranked 66^th in the world. As a comparison, the 2010 GDP per capita for various countries are: US: US$47,199; France: US$39,640; Malaysia: US$8,373; China: US$4,428.

South Africa is not doing too badly on these counts.

Data Source: World Bank; Graph: Generated by me

Map: The Freedom of Countries

2012-01-28T12:30:00.007+08:00

This map shows the freedom in the world – the freedom ratings by country in 2011. There is a large cluster of countries in the Middle East / North Africa, Russia / Central Asia, China and Indo-China where the countries are rated “not free”. Note that these are ratings by Freedom House on political rights and civil liberties for the year 2011, which take into account the events of the Arab Spring.

Data Source: Freedom House

If you compare this with the Christian map and the Muslim map, you can see that many of the majority-Christian nations are rated “free”, while many of the Muslim (the Middle East / North Africa) countries are rated “not free”. It may be a coincidence – or due to the lack of freedom in these countries, the population does not profess any other religion other than the official one. Of course, ratings (as well as professions of religion) have to be taken with a pinch of salt.

Data Source: Freedom House; Map: Generated by me

Map: Christian Population in the World

2012-01-27T11:46:00.005+08:00

This map shows the number of Christians as a percentage of the total population in each country. As you can see, the countries with large percentage of Christians are in Europe, North America, South America and sub-Saharan Africa. Again, the map shows the number of Christians as a percentage of the total population in each country, not the number of Christians in each country.

Data Source: Pew Research Center

There is a large swath of countries in the Middle East / North Africa, South Asia, North Asia and Southeast Asia, where the percentage of Christians is low. The populations of these countries are mainly from other religions, such as Islam (Middle East / North Africa, Indonesia), Hinduism (India) or Buddhism (Japan, maybe China). The contrast with the countries with high percentage of Muslims can be seen if you refer to the Muslim map of the world.

Data Source: Pew Research Center; Map: Generated by me

Map: Muslim Population in the World

2012-01-26T11:33:00.004+08:00

This map shows the number of Muslims as a percentage of the total population in each country. As you can see, there is a large concentration of countries in the Middle East / North Africa / Central Asia belt where the country percentage of Muslims is highest (usually more than 95%). The other large cluster is in the Southeast Asia region, including Indonesia and Malaysia.

Data Source: Pew Research Center

The map shows the number of Muslims as a percentage of the total population in each country, not the number of Muslims in each country. For example, there is a large population of Muslims in China, but this is small compared to the total population in China. See also the Christian map and the Freedom map.

Data Source: Pew Research Center; Map: Generated by me

About GraphTheWorld

2012-01-02T11:29:00.000+08:00

GraphTheWorld is an attempt to see or show the world and its phenomenon through graphs, maps, charts, infographics – basically anything visual.