Sectors are broad groupings of industries and represent key sections of the U.S. economy. Investor's Business Daily tracks sectors through proprietary indexes each day on the General Market & Sectors page.

Reading sector movements helps judge the overall market because different sectors perk up at different stages of the business cycle. For example, the defensive sector (This sector includes supermarket chains, utilities, etc., which are sometimes viewed as havens during market slumps. People don't change their spending much in such industries even when times are tough.) rises during times of economic weakness or when investors think the economy is headed down. The high-technology sector has been strong during expansion phases.

To get another picture of market behavior, Investor's Business Daily also tracks a number of Market Sector Indexes by performance over the past three months. The list includes IBD's proprietary sector indexes plus others that are widely followed such as the Dow Jones Transportation Index.

The indexes are groupings of key stocks in each of these sectors to gauge the health of that segment of the market. For example, the Consumer Index includes companies such as Wal-Mart and The Gap. Each index is boldfaced if it outperformed the New York Stock Exchange Composite the prior day. Also, stars denote which sectors led the market since the start of the year (the first column) and the day before (on the right).

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