Stats › Global markets and exchanges › Market cap to GDP
Market capitalisation to GDP by country
This is a simple idea: take the total value of a country's listed companies and divide it by the size of that country's economy. You get a percentage. The world average across 70 countries in 2024 was 69.95%, and the numbers run from 2.2% at the bottom to over 1,000% at the top.
That top figure is Hong Kong at 1,118.24%, more than eleven times its own economy, and it's the fastest way to understand what this measure does and doesn't do. Hong Kong isn't eleven times more expensive than everywhere else. Its exchange hosts a large number of Chinese companies whose business sits in mainland China, while the bottom of the fraction is Hong Kong's own small economy. The ratio is describing a listing venue, not a valuation.
On this page you'll find the top ten, the world average, where the United States sits at 216.29%, and a section on what the measure is honestly good for. It's the same concept as the Buffett indicator, just applied to every country instead of one. I put it together because this ratio gets quoted constantly as evidence that a market is expensive, and it is close to the wrong tool for that job. Two sources, both linked below with their vintages. The World Bank data behind it is free to download, so you can rebuild the table yourself if you want to.
The world average stock market capitalisation is 69.95% of GDP across 70 countries in 2024. Hong Kong is an extreme outlier at 1,118.24%, more than eleven times its own economy, because it hosts companies whose operations sit almost entirely in mainland China. The United States is fourth at 216.29%, behind South Africa and Saudi Arabia. The measure is useful for comparing financial system depth and close to useless for comparing valuations, which is exactly how it is usually used.
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