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Rupert Watts

Head of Factors and Dividends, S&P Dow Jones Indices

Rupert Watts is Head of Factors and Dividends at S&P Dow Jones Indices. His field focuses on alternate beta strategies, including factor-based indices, dividends and quantitative strategies. In his role, Rupert works closely with the Sales, Marketing and Global Research & Design departments to bring new ideas to market.
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Feb 11, 2026

A New Generation of Buyback Indices: Introducing the S&P 500 Buyback Aristocrats Index

The latest addition to the S&P Aristocrats Index Series, the S&P 500® Buyback Aristocrats Index represents a new generation of buyback indices. This index tracks companies that have consistently reduced their common shares outstanding for at least 10 consecutive years—a rare achievement that signals disciplined capital management, financial strength and a steadfast commitment to shareholder…

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Feb 6, 2026

How AI Is Transforming Index Construction: Introducing the S&P 3AI Indices

The recent advent of artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming daily life from streamlining routine tasks to augmenting productivity and facilitating data-driven decisions. Within indexing, it is a natural progression to explore how these technologies can enhance index construction within a human-validated and governed framework. Integrating machine learning, a subset of AI, systematically enables the analysis…

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May 15, 2024

Identifying Economic Moats Using a Quantitative Lens: The S&P 500 Economic Moat Index

Popularized by Warren Buffett, the term economic moat refers to a company’s sustainable competitive advantage that allows it to preserve market share and generate high profits over the long term. In this analogy, companies are compared to medieval castles surrounded by deep and wide moats, which protected the castles from attack. In the same way,…

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Oct 12, 2023

Can Active Managers Outsmart the S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats?

Underperformance of many active managers against their broad market benchmarks has been well documented.1 However, we thought it would be interesting to apply this comparison specifically to the dividend market. In this blog, we will examine how the S&P 500® Dividend Aristocrats® stacks up against actively managed U.S. equity income funds. Recognized as one of…

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Aug 25, 2022

Clean Energy Demand Fueled by Inflation Reduction Act

On Aug. 16, 2022, President Joe Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law, which includes the largest ever climate-related investment by the U.S. federal government. Devoting USD 370 billion to climate and energy programs, the act commits the U.S. to a roughly 40% emissions reduction by 2030. This landmark bill is the latest example…

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Jul 6, 2022

Putting the Pedal to the Metal: The S&P Global Core Battery Metals Index

While electric vehicles have been attractive to environmentally conscious consumers for several decades, in recent years, they have come into their own as innovation has made them more accessible and practical. With the current prices at the pump, now more than ever, consumers are turning to electric vehicles as a greener and more economical option….

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Jun 24, 2022

Simplicity Yields Outperformance: The S&P 500 Low Volatility High Dividend Index

Last week, the S&P 500® officially entered a bear market, dropping more than 20% from its record close in January. However, not all equity indices suffered comparable losses, and one such example is the S&P 500 Low Volatility High Dividend Index. In fact, this index has outperformed by a wide margin so far in 2022….

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Apr 4, 2022

S&P QVM Top 90% Indices: Looking under the Hood of the March 2022 Rebalance

Since their launch in April 2021, the S&P Quality, Value, and Momentum Top 90% Multi-factor Indices (the “S&P QVM Top 90% Indices”) have been a great addition to our multi-factor lineup. These indices are designed to track companies in the top 90% of their respective underlying index universe, ranked by their multi-factor score. To support…

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Feb 14, 2022

S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats: Defensive Attributes, Growing Dividends, and Competitive Yields

Driven primarily by the U.S. Federal Reserve’s plan to tighten monetary policy and curb inflation, and compounded by geopolitical tensions and earnings, the S&P 500® finished January down 5.26%. Market participants contemplating how to position themselves for the path ahead should not overlook dividend growth strategies such as the S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats®. To be…

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Aug 26, 2021

Risk Parity Act Two: Presenting the S&P Risk Parity 2.0 Indices

While the rationale behind risk parity is well understood, the implementation frameworks often differ. For example, some implementations are purely passive while others are more active, the way risk is defined can differ, and the underlying instruments used can vary. In 2018, the S&P Risk Parity Indices became the first transparent, rules-based benchmarks offered in…

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