Standard & Poor's Emerging Markets Database Index Announcement

Effective November 1, 2004:

Standard and Poor's is announcing the following changes to its methodology for emerging markets stock indices:

Change in Taiwan’s foreign investment limit
Change in investability screens
Slovakia to move to Frontier market status
Pakistan, Jordan and Colombia to go on watch list for inclusion to investable indices

Change in Taiwan’s foreign investment limit: In response to the recent removal of foreign investment limits in the Taiwan equity markets S&P EMDB will gradually remove the foreign investment limits applicable to Taiwanese stocks in the S&P/IFCI indices. Effective November 1st the foreign investment limit will be increased to 0.75. Effective May 1st in a special one time rebalancing the limit will be changed to 1.00 and Taiwan will be treated as 100% open except in certain sectors where foreign ownership is restricted by other government regulations.

Starting October 15, 2004 S&P will also publish a provisional S&P/IFCI data files without general foreign investment limit for Taiwan on a weekly basis. This will merge into the final index effective May 1st 2005.

Change in Investability Screens:
Investability screens will be amended as follows:

To join the series, a stock must have:
- A combined minimum free float market capitalization of USD 100 million for all equity share classes of the company
- A minimum of $20 million value traded for the last twelve months for the particular equity class to be included
A stock will be removed from the series:
- If the combined free float market capitalization of all the share classes of a company falls below $ 75 million
- If the equity share class has a value traded of less than $ 5 million during the preceding year

Slovakia to move to Frontier market status:
Over the last few years the Slovakian market has consistently seen an erosion of its market capitalization due to acquisitions and mergers. Currently the S&P/IFCG Slovakia index has only 4 stocks and a market capitalization of less than $300 million. In view of its shrinking size S&P EMDB has decided to treat this market as a frontier market and drop it from its S&P/IFCG coverage. Effective November 1st, 2004 the S&P/IFCG Slovakia index will be calculated monthly as part of its Frontier Market Composite Index.

Pakistan, Jordan and Colombia to go on watch list for inclusion to investable indices:
Pakistan, Jordan and Colombia were dropped from the S&/IFCI series in November of 2001 due to their much reduced size. Since then these markets have rebounded back and are once again receiving investor interest. They are being put on the watch list for reinclusion in the S&P/IFCI series in November 2005.

Please contact Alka Banerjee at (212) 438-3536 or Taber Johnson at (212) 438-1333 with questions or comments.

MEXICO: Desc – B Share Decrease

Effective July 26, 2004, S&P/EMDB will decrease the number of shares outstanding for Desc – B (EMDB Code 273340.1 / SEDOL 2265120), an S&P/IFCG and S&P/IFCI index constituent, by 186.9754 million shares via a negative new issue. The company is updating the number of shares as a result of the conversion of Series B into A shares. If the above share increase had occurred on July 09, 2004, the weight of Desc – B in S&P/IFCI Mexico Index would have decreased to 0.33% from 0.39%.

Malaysia- PSC Industries Bhd. Share Increase (eff. 07/26/2004)

S&P EMDB will increase the number of shares for PSC Industries Bhd. (S&P/EMDB Code 548648.1/ SEDOL 6791870), an S&P/IFCI and S&P/IFCG Index constituent, by 15.8230 million shares, effective July 26, 2004. The share increase is the result of a private placement of new shares. If this change had occurred on July 9, 2004, the S&P/IFCI market weight of PSC Industries Bhd. would have changed to 0.42% from 0.39%.