Direxion, the company best known for its suite of leveraged and inverse ETFs, began the process of shutting down one of its few non-leveraged funds, the Airlines Shares ETF (FLYX) earlier this week, citing a lack of assets as the main culprit for the fund’s demise. The fund stopped trading on October 10th and over the next week the product will liquidate its portfolio of airline stocks before paying out to investors after that. The fund never really caught on with investors as the product had assets of less than $3 million and saw volume of roughly 800 shares a day over the past three months. Furthermore, at a 0.55% expense ratio, the product only generated a meager $16,500 for the company in fees, hardly enough to turn a profit for the ETF issuer. [click to continue…]
The new quarter started on a down note across the board, as more fears over Greece and concerns over a hard landing in China weighed on markets. The losses were pretty significant in most sectors although the worst of it was contained to the financial and basic materials corners of the market. Beyond these two [...]
Although Hurricane Irene wasn’t nearly as devastating as some had feared, the storm did knock out power to millions and ground thousands of flights across the Northeast. Yet, the worst of the storm now appears to be over as flights are returning to the skies in major airports in New York, Washington D.C., and Boston, suggesting that [...]
Though most investors will be focused on comments from Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and our U.S. GDP results, there will be another name to remember as we head into the weekend; Irene. Now that we are midway through hurricane season, which lasts from the beginning of June through the end of November, the U.S. has [...]
This past week was a pretty poor one for markets as a number of solid earnings reports were not enough to shake fears of a U.S. debt default. Republicans and Democrats remained deadlocked over how best to reign in spending and raise the ceiling ahead of the August second deadline, sending much of Wall Street [...]
The month of May was a generally disappointing stretch for investors, as both international and domestic equity markets struggled to overcome obstacles new and old. Commodities, which had been a nice source of absolute returns for much of the last year, fell on hard times as well; precious metals went into a brief freefall, and [...]
This past week marked the start to earnings season, and for the most part the reports disappointed investors and sparked sell-offs. One of the most important reports to hit the market this week came from banking giant JP Morgan. The firm reported a huge profit increase of 67% but sluggish revenues and little revenue growth [...]
Exchange-traded products were first introduced over two decades ago to give investors alternative options to high cost mutual funds. Since then, the industry has grown exponentially, with assets now over $1 trillion, and the total number of ETPs on the market eclipsing the 1,100 mark with new funds debuting all the time. But now that [...]
Last year was a good year for most asset classes, as investor portfolios continued to recover from the recent recession. The difference in performance between many comparable funds was significant, and many of the best performers of 2010 are relatively small funds that maintain considerably smaller asset bases than their more popular competitors. Below, we [...]
Direxion, a leading provider of both 2x and 3x leveraged ETFs, rolled out three new additions to its product line on Wednesday. In addition to a paired offering of 2x leveraged ETFs delivering amplified exposure to gold miners, Direxion also debuted its first non-leveraged product. The Direxion Airline Shares ETF (FLYX) will seek to replicate [...]
Thanks to ongoing economic worries and moderating oil prices, the airline industry has managed to fly under the radar for much of 2010. While a major volcanic eruption put flights in focus for a few weeks, the ash eventually cleared, and so did the buzz about the industry. But with earnings season progressing and a [...]
