In recent years interest in achieving exposure to emerging markets has intensified tremendously, as the developing economies of the world have established themselves as the clear leaders of GDP growth while advanced economies have struggled to regain their footing. While there are dozens of countries that fall under “emerging” status, exposure to this investment strategy has generally focused around the BRIC bloc that includes four economies expected to see their contribution to global GDP swell in coming decades. [click to continue…]
When considering the equity allocation of an investor portfolio, perhaps the most common bifurcation made is between developed and emerging markets. The distinction between developed and emerging markets has become a hot topic in recent years thanks to the tremendous gaps in growth and risk between the two groups. As developed markets have struggled to [...]
When mutual funds broke on to the investing scene, they won praise for their ability to pool assets and efficiently deliver exposure to a large basket of underlying securities. ETFs, while different from mutual funds in many ways (see five of them here), generally share this appeal; they offer an even more cost efficient way [...]
It’s been an interesting week in the world of ETFs: U.S. equity markets ended the week on a sour note with most benchmarks down about 2%. Here are the ETF Database staff picks of the week’s most important and interesting stories from around the Web:
With sluggish growth forecasted for the next few quarters an unemployment rate quickly approaching 10%, many U.S. investors are looking beyond their borders for new investment opportunities. While developed European and Asia Pacific economies have received a significant amount of attention, the most popular investment destinations remain the four largest emerging market countries: Brazil, Russia, [...]
The Cold War may have ended decades ago, but relations between the U.S. and Russia have never fully recovered. In recent years, tensions between these world powers have been particularly strained, as the countries clashed on issues including democracy, missile defense, NATO expansion, and independence for Kosovo. Concerns of armed conflict and nuclear war are [...]
In addition to numerous earnings reports and key economic releases on the home front, U.S. investors have several international situations to monitor this week, ranging from elections in Indonesia to the ongoing dramas in Iran and Honduras. As if that wasn’t enough, two BRIC nations are also in the headlines Monday, as Russia welcomes president Obama for [...]
