The wounds inflected on the market by American International Group's implosion have reached far and wide, including into the world of indexing. Even with the federal government bailing out the embattled insurer, AIG has lost its place in the venerable Dow Jones Industrial Average, as well as a few other Dow Jones benchmarks.

The salt—or should we say, the sodium-laced mac 'n' cheese—that got poured on the wounds of AIG shareholders came in mid-September, when Dow Jones announced the firm would be replaced in the DJIA by every college student's favorite chef, Kraft Foods. Kraft becomes the first food maker to enter the DJIA, one of the most widely used benchmarks by money managers and institutional investors. In all, Dow Jones Indexes has removed American International Group from three benchmarks, including its Dow Jones Global Titans 50 Index and Dow Jones Insurance Titans 30 Index.

The decision was announced a day after the Federal Reserve had to step in and provide an $85 billion secured revolving credit line to AIG in order for it to stay afloat. Dow Jones said in a statement that the decision to remove AIG was being made within the indexes "due to financial distress." It added that the 112-year-old Dow Jones Industrial Average benchmark decided not to replace AIG with potential financial names due to the "extremely unsettled conditions" in the sector. For the DJIA to change sectors is not surprising or problematic, as the DJIA has no predetermined criteria other than being limited to U.S. companies at the forefront of their respective industries.

The DJIA is the basis for a few exchange-traded funds, here and overseas—most notably the DIAMONDS (AMEX: DIA). ProShares also has leveraged and short ETF plays on the index. There are also ETFs tracking other DJ benchmarks listed in the U.S. and in Europe.

Financials are the third-largest weighting in the Dow Jones Global Titans 50 Index, where AIG is being replaced by oil and gas company Schlumberger Ltd (NYSE: SLB). In the case of the Insurance Titans 30 Index, AIG is being replaced by QBE Insurance Group Ltd (ASX: QBE). QBE has released a statement separately indicating that it had no direct exposure to AIG, Merrill Lynch or Lehman Brothers within its investment portfolio.