Global Market Fear Index
A world fear gauge. 8 volatility indexes across the US, Europe and Japan, China, India, Australia, Brazil and emerging markets, each ranked against its own ten-year history and blended into one 0–100 reading.
Separate from the AI Doom score, which it does not affect. Updated Oct 21, 2026 · 14:35 UTC.
Points contributed
Percentile × weight. Sums to 52.9.
- Cboe VIX54th pct × 20% weight10.7
- Cboe VXEFA47th pct × 20% weight9.4
- Cboe EM ETF VIX78th pct × 10% weight7.8
- Cboe Brazil ETF VIX98th pct × 7.5% weight7.3
- Cboe VXN69th pct × 10% weight6.9
- India VIX58th pct × 10% weight5.8
- Cboe China ETF VIX33th pct × 12.5% weight4.2
- S&P/ASX 200 VIX7th pct × 10% weight0.7
8 fear gauges, one world
Most fearful: Brazil (Cboe Brazil ETF VIX, 98th percentile). Calmest: Australia (7th). Biggest 5-day move: Cboe Brazil ETF VIX +36.5%.
Regimes
Applied to each index's percentile and to the blended score.
Volatility is below three-quarters of the past decade.
Typical conditions for this market.
Hedging demand is clearly above normal.
Among the most fearful 15% of days in ten years.
Not covered yet
Major regional gauges we couldn't get from a free, keyless public source reliably enough to publish daily.
- Euro Stoxx 50 VSTOXX · Eurozonestoxx.com data files time out from our runner; not on Yahoo
- Nikkei Stock Average VI · JapanNikkei's CSV download returns 403 to scripts; not on Yahoo
- Hang Seng VHSI · Hong Kongno keyless public endpoint found; not on Yahoo (China is covered by VXFXI)
- KOSPI 200 VKOSPI · South KoreaKRX data requires an interactive session; not on Yahoo
What is a global volatility index?
A volatility index such as the Cboe VIX measures how much movement options traders expect over the next 30 days. When investors rush to buy protection, it rises, which is why it's called a “fear gauge”. Every major market has its own: India VIX for the Nifty 50, the S&P/ASX 200 VIX in Australia, and Cboe's ETF-based gauges for China, Brazil, emerging markets and developed markets outside the US.
Their raw levels can't be compared directly: a reading of 20 is calm for Brazil and tense for Australia. The Global Market Fear Index fixes that by ranking each gauge against its own past ten years and averaging those ranks with regional weights. The result is one world fear index from 0 (calmest ever) to 100 (most fearful), with full method and data on the methodology page and in volatility.json.
Index levels are end-of-day closes, or the latest intraday value for markets still trading, via the Yahoo Finance chart API and Cboe's public index history files. Not financial advice.
One email every Monday. Every number sourced.
What moved the index, the week's rogue-AI incidents, and who changed their p(doom). Five minutes, no hype.
- The score, its drivers and the week's biggest market moves
- New alignment incidents, with sources
- p(doom) changes and the Global Market Fear reading