Posts tagged as:

FAS

ProShares Planning Short, Leveraged Regional Bank ETFs

by Michael Johnston on March 2, 2010

ProShares, a leading provider of inverse and leveraged ETFs, has filed for approval on seven addition ETFs, including four “ultra” international ETFs and three products focusing on a popular regional bank index. The international ETFs complement four existing 200% inverse products, and include: [click to continue…]

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Seven Surprising ETF Trading Stats

by Michael Johnston on January 25, 2010

One of the best sources of information on the state of the ETF industry is the monthly data download from the National Stock Exchange. While the most interesting numbers are generally the fund flows into exchange-traded products and the issuer “totem pole,” the release has some pretty thorough statistics on notional and share trading volumes. A closer look at the December version reveals some interesting insights about the ETF industry and sheds some light on a few interesting patterns behind ETF use among investors: [click to continue…]

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Defending The “Most Dangerous ETFs”

by Michael Johnston on September 25, 2009

Don Dion, who covers ETFs for TheStreet.com and runs Dion Money Management, recently wrote a three part series highlighting the “10 Most Dangerous ETFs”. Dion notes that as the ETF industry continues to expand beyond “plain vanilla” funds, investors are introduced to products that can face significant liquidity issues, be subject to increased regulatory scrutiny, [...]

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Most Popular ETFs: Leveraged, Financial ETFs Among Winners

by Michael Johnston on July 21, 2009

The old saying “any publicity is good publicity” certainly seems to ring true in the ETF industry. Over the last several months, leveraged ETFs have been the subject of intense scrutiny, first from individual investors and analysts, and more recently from regulatory agencies such as FINRA. Despite allegations that these funds are dishonest products that [...]

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Direxion ETFs To Undergo Reverse Split

by Michael Johnston on July 7, 2009

Direxion, the ETF firm that pioneered 3x leveraged ETFs, announced today that it will execute reverse splits on two of its funds, the Daily Financial Bull 3x Shares (FAS) and Daily Financial Bear 3x Shares (FAZ). FAS will undergo a 1-for-5 reverse split, meaning that the number of FAS shares outstanding will decline by approximately [...]

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FINRA Zeroes In On Leveraged ETFs

by Michael Johnston on July 3, 2009

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) has completed an initial information sweep of U.S. firms that sell leveraged ETFs, seeking to gather information about sales of these products to investors with accounts of less than $10 million. Leveraged funds, which seek to amplify daily returns on a benchmark equity or bond index by using leverage, [...]

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How To Fix the Leveraged ETF Mess

by Michael Johnston on June 26, 2009

Leveraged ETFs have quickly become the hot-button issue in the ETF industry, dividing investors and observers into two distinct camps. On the one side are sophisticated day traders who believe these funds, which use derivatives and other complex financial instruments to provide amplified daily returns on a target index, are the greatest thing since sliced bread. And on [...]

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Financial ETFs in Focus: Obama’s Financial Regulation Overhaul

by Michael Johnston on June 15, 2009

President Barack Obama is expected this week to announce sweeping changes to the way the much-maligned U.S. financial industry is regulated. The changes, which are to be unveiled Wednesday, are expected to include the development of a more centralized regulation system and enhanced consumer-protection capabilities. Speaking on the new developments, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner noted [...]

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