Innovation continues to be a defining characteristic of the quickly growing fixed income ETF space, as evidenced by the launch of the SPDR Barclays Capital Issuer Scored Corporate Bond ETF (CBND) on Thursday by State Street. The new ETF will seek to replicate the performance of the Barclays Capital Issuer Scored Corporate Index, a benchmark that includes U.S. dollar denominated corporate issues that are rated investment grade (Baa3/BBB- or higher) by at least two of the big three ratings agencies. [click to continue…]
March marked the most active month yet in 2011 for the ETF industry. While both of the previous months saw a healthy boost in funds introduced and filed for, March brought 38 new funds to market, expanding the exchange traded world even further. With the total number of funds now nearing 1,200, investors have more [...]
ProShares, the largest issuer of inverse and leveraged ETFs, continues to build out the portion of its product lineup offering opportunities to gain short exposure to fixed income securities. The new Short Investment Grade (IGS) will seek to deliver daily results that correspond to the inverse of the iBoxx $ Liquid Investment Grade Index, a [...]
ProShares, the Maryland-based firm known for a suite of leveraged and inverse ETFs, has launched the first ETF offering daily inverse exposure to junk bonds. The ProShares Short High Yield (SJB) will seek to deliver daily results that correspond to -100% of the daily change in the iBoxx $ Liquid High Yield Index. That index [...]
ProShares, the largest issuer of inverse and leveraged ETFs, has plans to give investors more options for betting against fixed income securities. In a recent SEC filing, the Maryland-based company detailed three bond ETFs, including two offering -100% daily exposure to fixed income benchmarks and another offering -200% daily exposure. The proposed ETFs include:
The last few years have seen tremendous growth in ETF assets, as investors have gradually embraced the exchange-traded structure as a tool for establishing exposure to everything from emerging markets to micro cap stocks to commodities. Interest in bond ETFs has been particularly strong; according to year-end data from the National Stock Exchange, bond ETFs [...]
Creativity on the product development front has become a defining characteristic of the ETF industry, as the surge in the number of ETF offerings in recent years has been driven not by duplication but by innovation. Many of the new fund launches are first-to-market concepts, offering exposure to asset classes or strategies not previously available [...]
Russell Investments and Research Affiliates announced this week the creation of a new suite of indexes based on the Fundamental index methodology developed by Research Affiliates founder Rob Arnott. The two companies formed a partnership last year, and are now introducing 24 fundamental-weighted benchmarks measuring the performance of domestic and international equity markets.
American equity markets endured another rocky session as most companies reached a high point in early morning trading before retreating back to finish up the day. The Dow managed to edge higher by eight points while the Nasdaq and S&P 500 posted more robust gains of 0.8% and 0.4%, respectively, while most commodity markets jumped [...]
State Street, the Boston-based firm that maintains a broad-based lineup of fixed income ETFs, recently made an interesting SEC filing detailing plans for a new type of bond ETF. The proposed SPDR Barclays Capital Issuer Scored Corporate Bond ETF (CBND) would seek to replicate the performance of the Barclays Capital Issuer Scored Corporate Index, a [...]
As investors have become more comfortable with the marriage of fixed income exposure and the ETF wrapper, billions of dollars have flowed into bond ETFs in recent years. Impressive innovation in the space has provided investors with more options than ever before, including enhanced granularity in virtually every corner of the fixed income market. Still, [...]
