Wilshire 5000 Total Market Index (TMWX)

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Wilshire 5000 Total Market Index (FT Wilshire 5000)

Key takeaways

  • The FT Wilshire 5000 (formerly the Wilshire 5000 Total Market Index, TMWX) is a broad, market-capitalization-weighted index intended to represent the investible U.S. equity market.
  • It aims to capture essentially 100% of the investible U.S. market by including a very large number of U.S. equities with readily available prices.
  • Constituents and market value have varied widely: the count peaked above 7,500 in the late 1990s and was about 3,687 at the end of 2021.

What the index is

The FT Wilshire 5000 is a total-market index that tracks U.S. common equities that meet Wilshire’s eligibility rules (readily available prices, excluding extremely thinly traded or bulletin-board issues). It was rebranded as the FT Wilshire 5000 as part of a partnership with The Financial Times; before that it was commonly known as the Wilshire 5000 Total Market Index.

How it works

  • Market-cap weighting: each security’s weight in the index is proportional to its market capitalization, so larger companies have a bigger impact on index performance.
  • Broad coverage: the index includes mega-, large-, mid-, small- and micro-cap stocks that meet liquidity and listing criteria, giving a wide representation of the U.S. equity market.
  • Sector exposure: because it is market-cap weighted, sector weights shift with market values; for example, information technology has often comprised a large share of the index.

Special considerations

  • The FT Wilshire 5000 is intended to be broader than commonly cited benchmarks like the S&P 500 or the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which focus on large-cap stocks. The Wilshire index includes many smaller-cap firms those indices omit.
  • Wilshire publishes related indexes in the FT Wilshire 5000 Series to provide targeted exposures, including:
  • FT Wilshire 2500 (broad U.S. market subset)
  • FT Wilshire US Mega Cap
  • FT Wilshire US Large Cap
  • FT Wilshire US Mid Cap
  • FT Wilshire US Small Cap
  • FT Wilshire US Micro Cap

Brief history and milestones

  • Created by Wilshire Associates (established for historical benchmarking of the U.S. market), the index’s base value was set using a December 31, 1980 reference point. Early methodology used a point-to-market-cap relationship that has since changed with routine divisor adjustments.
  • Constituents expanded through the 1990s, peaking above 7,500, then contracted as corporate actions and market structure changed; by the end of 2021 the index contained roughly 3,687 securities.
  • Notable index level milestones:
  • Strong growth through the 1980s and 1990s, reaching multi-thousand-point highs by 2000.
  • All-time highs in the mid-2000s, followed by a sharp decline during the Great Recession (reaching a low in 2009).
  • Subsequent recovery and new highs in the 2010s and early 2020s as equity markets expanded.

Other broad U.S. market indexes

Several other indexes aim to represent the full U.S. market and are often used for benchmarking or passive products:
* CRSP US Total Market Index — broad coverage across market caps with thousands of holdings.
* Dow Jones U.S. Total Market Index — a market-cap-weighted, broad U.S. equity index maintained by S&P Dow Jones Indices.
* Russell 3000 Index — tracks the 3,000 largest U.S.-traded stocks and covers roughly 98% of U.S. incorporated equity market capitalization.

Conclusion

The FT Wilshire 5000 is among the most comprehensive single indexes for U.S. equities, designed to reflect the performance of the investible U.S. stock market across nearly all market-cap segments. Its breadth makes it a useful benchmark for total-market exposure, while targeted FT Wilshire sub-indexes provide options for investors seeking specific cap-size or sector tilts.