News Agency Direkt and GES Investment Services today introduce a new index family of ethical indices on the Nordic markets. The indices consist of all listed companies in Stockholm, Oslo, Helsinki and Copenhagen, with the exception of those companies that do not meet a set of ethical criteria.

GES Investment Services will track all companies on a six-month basis according to the ethical criteria that are included in the analysis models GES Global Ethical Standard and GES Controversial. These criteria are based on international standards on the environment, human rights and business ethics. Companies with production and/or sales of weapons, tobacco, alcohol, pornography and gambling are not included.

The ethical indices have had a higher return than comparable indices. In Denmark, SIX/GES Ethical Index has since January 1, 2002, had a return of 36 percent, which is 17 percentage points higher than the KBX Cap GIs return of 19 percent.

"We think that...