Datastream classifies each company by industry, and a sector is any group of stocks with the same industrial classification.
Each sector on the Datastream system comprises a representative sample of major stocks within that market and with that industrial classification. Datastream uses these constituent stocks when calculating an index for a sector.
To access an index, use a sector mnemonic – see below
To view the constituent stocks, use a list mnemonic – see below
Sector mnemonics are made up of an industry mnemonic and a country code suffix. You can use sector mnemonics to display either:
Aggregate values for a sector. Aggregate values can be used when comparing an equity to its sector or comparing sectors. An example of the mnemonic for obtaining aggregate values for a sector is CHEMSUK where CHEMS is an industry mnemonic and UK is a two character country suffix (CHEMSUK obtains information for the Datastream Chemicals, commodity sector in the UK).
A list of companies within a sector. Sector lists, also known as industry lists, allow you to identify and compare companies within a sector. Use a sector mnemonic to create a list mnemonic – see below
A list mnemonic comprises a sector mnemonic prefixed by an L. An example of the mnemonic for obtaining a list of companies within a sector is LCHEMSUK where L is the list prefix, CHEMS is an industry mnemonic and UK is a two character country suffix; LCHEMSUK thus lists the constituent stocks in the Datastream Chemicals, commodity sector in the UK
For the UK and US, we maintain sector lists based on a larger number of companies than used in the index calculations. These special sector lists can be accessed using the suffixes A and Z respectively.
For example, CHEMSA where CHEMS is an industry mnemonic and A is the special list suffix for the UK; CHEMSA thus lists all the UK chemical companies held on the Datastream database