Dow Jones updates its industrial average

NEW YORK -- Bank of America Corp. and Chevron Corp. will replace tobacco company Altria Group Inc. and manufacturer Honeywell International Inc. in the Dow Jones industrial average, giving the stock market's best-known indicator bigger slices of the banking and energy sectors.

The changes to the index, which since 1928 has comprised 30 stocks, reflects changes at Altria, better known by its former name, Phillip Morris Cos. The maker of Marlboro cigarettes last year spun off its Kraft Foods Inc. division after earlier selling most of its Miller Brewing unit, and it will soon corral its international tobacco operations into a separate company.

The blue chip index's parent, Dow Jones & Co., said the slimmed down Altria will be too small and narrowly focused to warrant inclusion in the Dow. Phillip Morris became part of the index in 1985.

Dow Jones also reviewed the other 29 components, and the decision to bump Honeywell from the lineup comes amid a rise in the importance of the banking and energy businesses.

Bank of America, based in Charlotte, N.C., is the nation's biggest bank by deposits. American Express Co., Citigroup Inc. and JP Morgan Chase & Co. and are already part of the index.

Chevron had been part of the Dow twice before. The company, then known as Standard Oil Co. of California, had a brief stint in the mid-1920s before what would become Chevron had a long run as a Dow stock from 1930 until 1999.

Honeywell, which has assorted manufacturing operations, is the smallest company in the index by revenue and earnings.

The changes, which occur Feb. 19, are the first since April 2004.