Nikkei 225 Index Welcomes "AI-style Reshuffle": Capcom, International Electric, and JX Metals Enter the Fray, While Three Traditional Giants Including Konica Minolta are Eliminated.

Nikkei announced on Friday that game developer Capcom Co., chip equipment manufacturer Kokusai Electric Corp, and semiconductor materials company JX Advanced Metals Corp will be officially included in the Nikkei 225 Stock Average starting October 1. Meanwhile, truck manufacturer Archion Corp, office equipment giant Konica Minolta Inc., and environmental engineering company Kanadevia Corp. will be removed from the benchmark index as part of this regular adjustment. Nikkei stated that Capcom, known globally for its Resident Evil and Monster Hunter game series, was selected to ensure a balanced representation of industry sectors within the index; the inclusion of Kokusai Electric and JX Advanced Metals was primarily based on market liquidity considerations. This adjustment to the constituent stocks is expected to have a direct impact on the respective stocks, as passive funds tracking the index will carry out buy and sell operations based on the adjustment results, leading to stock price fluctuations. So far this year, the Nikkei 225 index, which has a high weighting in technology stocks, has accumulated a rise of about 29%, largely benefiting from the strong performance of chip-related stocks amid the artificial intelligence boom. On Friday, the Nikkei index closed up 1.3% in the Tokyo market. The Nikkei 225 index undergoes two regular reviews each year (in March and September), with adjustments aimed at reflecting changes in the market environment and maintaining the index's representativeness. Stock selection for the index is mainly based on two dimensions: market liquiditywhere stocks are evaluated based on trading volume and price volatility over the past five years, and the 450 stocks with the highest liquidity enter the "high liquidity pool," with the top 75 stocks not yet included being newly added; and industry balancewhere stocks are categorized into seven major sectors: technology, information communications, finance, consumer, industrial materials, capital goods and others, transportation, and utilities, ensuring that the number of constituent stocks matches the overall size of each sector. Among the three companies being removed, Konica Minolta has faced ongoing pressure in the digital camera and office equipment markets in recent years, leading to a decline in market capitalization and liquidity; meanwhile, the newly added Capcom has benefited from the reassessment of game IP value and performance growth, while Kokusai Electric and JX Advanced Metals have garnered market attention due to the booming semiconductor supply chain. This "reshuffling" also reflects a trend of the Nikkei index shifting towards high-growth technology manufacturing sectors.