Russell to add 46 bio-tech firms to U.S. indexes
Annual reconstitution process brings in 97 California-based firms

Tacoma, WA — June 25, 2007 — Forty-six biotechnology research and production firms, including 18 in California, moved into the broad-market Russell 3000® Index and/or Russell Microcap® Index when Russell's family of U.S. indexes were fully reconstituted after the equity markets closed Friday. These stocks replaced other companies that didn't fare as well during a widely positive year on Wall Street. Other industries that gained the most among the 277 additions to Russell's U.S. index universe are computer services (33), banks (32), drugs and pharmaceuticals (21) casualty-property insurance (27) and crude oil producers (20). New membership lists for Russell indexes will be posted today on www.russell.com/indexes.

Similarly, 43 banks currently in the Russell 3000 and Russell Microcap indexes were removed.

"Index reconstitution objectively captures the changing fortunes of companies and industries in the U.S. equity market," said Lori Richards, client service director for Russell indexes. "Our annual process provides investors with unbiased investment tools to track their 401k plans and other investments with the understanding that they truly reflect the investment opportunities in any given market segment."

Among the 50 states, California leads all others with 97 additions based in the Golden State. Rounding out the top five states with the highest number of additions are New York (56 companies), Texas (42 companies), Massachusetts (32) and New Jersey (24).

Other states with a relatively large number of firms flowing into the Russell indexes are Pennsylvania and Florida (22 each), Illinois (19), Washington (15) as well as Georgia and Ohio (14 each).

Two states with the largest disparity between additions and deletions are New York (net increase of 22 companies) and Washington (net increase of nine companies). Virginia, by contrast, sees a net decrease of seven.

"The rotation of who's in and who's out shows the changing nature of U.S. equity markets," said Richards. "We don't see a large movement to or from a particular sector or industry, but the process this year seems to be showing a great deal of competition between companies within the same sector."

Most of the deletions from the Russell 3000 dropped into the Russell Microcap, while those leaving the Russell Microcap moved up to the Russell 3000 or disappeared from Russell's U.S. index universe altogether.

Annual reconstitution of Russell U.S. and global indexes captures the investable universe of stocks as of May 31, ranking them by total market capitalization. On June 15, Russell posted its preliminary lists of companies set for addition to—or deletion from—the ranking of stocks that make up its U.S. equity indexes as well as the Russell Global Index. Final index membership remains in place for one year.

The reconstitution process is followed closely by many investors because the Russell indexes currently have $4 trillion in assets benchmarked to them and account for an industry-leading 54% of all institutional investment products that use a benchmark.

About Russell
Russell Investment Group aims to improve financial security for people by providing strategic advice, world-class implementation, state-of-the-art performance benchmarks and a range of institutional-quality investment products. With more than $200 billion in assets under management, Russell serves individual, institutional and advisor clients in more than 40 countries. Russell provides access to some of the world's best money managers. It helps investors put this access to work in corporate defined benefit and defined contribution plans, and in the life savings of individual investors.

Founded in 1936, Russell is a subsidiary of Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company and headquartered in Tacoma, Wash. Russell has principal offices in Amsterdam, Auckland, Hong Kong, Johannesburg, London, Melbourne, New York, Paris, San Francisco, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo and Toronto.

Contact:
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