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STOXX Ltd. Wins IFI Award For The Most Successful Indexes Underlying Exchange Traded Funds - Results Are Based On Votes By 300 Financial Institutions Globally

Date 20/03/2006

STOXX Ltd., the leading European index provider, today announced that it has won the award, “Index Provider That Has Created The Most Useful Exchange-Traded Fund Indexes (Europe)”. The award is presented by the U.K. based magazine International Fund Investment (IFI) and based on votes by 300 institutions.

Among the 300 different organizations that participated in the poll were institutional investors, brokers and organizations involved in the industry such as issuers and exchanges.

“This award proves that our indexes assure success for our clients’ exchange traded funds,” said Lars Hamich, managing director of STOXX Ltd. “With our extensive range of indexes – from blue-chip, broad-market and sector indexes to style, volatility, select dividend and theme indexes – we are in the best position to provide underlying indexes for the most diversified choice of exchange traded funds as well as for a wide range of innovative investment products. As the primary leader in the index business, our mission is to offer indexes for all sectors and for sophisticated investment trends, such as our family of select dividend indexes, reflecting future growth areas in the investment world well ahead of time.”

Also, the Dow Jones Euro STOXX 50 is the underlying index for an exchange-traded fund that won two IFI awards. The Dow Jones EURO STOXX 50 DVG by Deutsche Vermögensbildung GmbH received an award for the exchange traded fund which raised most assets in absolute terms - 1063.735 million Euro as of February 2006 - and for having the most efficient Total Expense Ratio – 0,15%.