ETF Database » LSC

Four ETFs That Have Held Their Ground During Crisis

Jared Cummans — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 11:00:55 +0000

The recent economic crisis has led to a frenzy of activity on Wall Street, as we have seen dramatic swings in both directions on a regular basis. Starting with a debt deal that did little to reassure investors, markets began to drop. Next came the downgrade from S&P, the first ever from a domestic credit rating agency, shaking markets around the globe as worries about a prolonged period of stagnant economic growth intensified. Stocks recovered slightly towards the end of last week, but a statement from Fed Chair Ben Bernanke seemed to scare some investors as the Fed decided to hold rates at the current ultra-low levels until mid-2013, suggesting there is little hope for our economy to experience substantial growth in the coming years [see also Three Equity ETFs Crushed By Monday’s Massacre]. The chaos that has blown through Wall Street over the last two weeks or so has [...]

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Using ETFs To Access Alternatives

Michael Johnston — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 22:00:08 +0000

The introduction and rapid expansion of the ETF industry has no doubt been a very positive development for investors big and small. The low fees characteristic of the exchange-traded structure have allowed cost-conscious investors to minimize expenses without sacrificing returns, while the enhanced tax efficiency and intraday trading capabilities have contributed increased flexibility to the investing public. As ETFs have gained traction with investors, the size of the product lineup has grown rapidly. What was relatively recently a few hundred funds offering exposure to “plain vanilla” stock and bond benchmarks has quickly grown to a stable of more than 1,100 exchange-traded products covering nearly every nook and cranny of the investable universe. This proliferation of ETFs has given investors more precise tools for accessing traditional asset classes, but it has also opened up investment strategies and asset classes that were previously either out-of-reach or that required considerable time and/or expenses [...]

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Ten Worst Performing ETFs Of 2010

Michael Johnston — Tue, 28 Dec 2010 12:00:54 +0000

In general, 2010 has been a pretty solid year for most portfolios. Despite lingering concerns about unemployment and mounting debt burdens, most global equity markets have moved higher on the year. Commodity markets have been red hot, with prices of many natural resources climbing to new highs thanks to strong demand from emerging markets and a shaky dollar. And while bonds have shown exceptional volatility during the last 12 months, many fixed income securities have managed to deliver at least modest gains as well. But there have, of course, been some disappointments this year as well. Below, we offer up some potential inspiration for contrarian investors: a list of ten of the worst performing ETFs of 2010. Performance data is as of December 21, and this list excludes all leveraged and inverse funds, as well as any ETFs that began trading during the year: 10. iPath EUR/USD Exchange Rate ETN [...]

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Five Things BusinessWeek Didn’t Tell You About Commodity ETFs

Eric Dutram — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 19:40:42 +0000

As a long-time subscriber to BusinessWeek, I generally enjoy their content and find their stories both informative and interesting. However, last week’s cover story entitled “Amber Waves of Pain” was unlike anything I had ever read by the company before. On the cover, the weekly magazine stated three times “Do Not Buy Commodity ETFs” and then encouraged subscribers to read more about “America’s Worst Investment” inside the issue. Needless to say, I was intrigued to see how a the magazine could make such a blanket statement over such a large segment of the market which by BusinessWeek’s own estimation has seen $277 billion in inflows by the end of last year. Admittedly, the magazine made a pretty good case of the problems which some of the largest futures-based commodity funds deal with. The article started by highlighting several issues which investors have become very familiar with in recent years such [...]

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Five ETFs To Give Your Portfolio Much-Needed Diversification

Michael Johnston — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 08:00:59 +0000

As seasoned investors know, any potential investment must be evaluated not on a stand-alone basis but on its contribution to an overall portfolio. In addition to considering the risk and return profile of a particular asset, the relationship between that asset and the other holdings of the investor is of vital importance in the construction of an efficient portfolio. The addition of assets that maintain low or negative correlations with other portfolio components can add valuable diversification benefits. Historically, investors have embraced international equities and real estate as strategic diversifiers to reduce overall portfolio volatility. And, historically, these asset classes did a pretty good job. But as most investors are painfully aware, international diversification let them down just when they needed it most. The most recent recession was global in nature, and correlations between the world’s equity markets shot towards 1.0 as the chaos ramped up. Real estate was a [...]

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Ten Commodity ETFs Every Investor Should Know (But Most Don’t)

Michael Johnston — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 07:00:14 +0000

Commodities are the new black in the world of investing, thanks in no small part to the rise of ETFs as the tool of choice in more and more portfolios. Commodity ETFs saw cash inflows of more than $30 billion in 2009, as total assets more than doubled on the year. According to the ETF screener, there are currently 91 exchange-traded commodity products, including inverse and leveraged funds. At the end of 2009, there was $73.7 billion in these funds, but most of these assets were concentrated in a handful of tickers. GLD alone accounted for more than half of commodity assets, and the top seven commodity funds (SLV, DBC, UNG, IAU, DBA, and DJP) made up almost 85% of the total amount. But there’s a lot more to the world of commodity ETFs than these “mega-funds.” Below are profiles of ten commodity ETFs that aren’t even on the radar [...]

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Seven Most Anticipated New ETFs Of 2010

Michael Johnston — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 08:00:09 +0000

Last year saw the continuation of the ETF industry’s impressive rise, with more than 100 new products hitting the market and a handful of new issuers entering into the arena. While many of the new exchange-traded products are “plain vanilla” funds that will compete directly with existing products, we also saw a number of truly innovative products that expanded the universe of asset classes available to all classes of investors. The last year has seen the introduction of sector-specific emerging markets and China ETFs, active bond funds from PIMCO, state-specific ETFs, and ETNs linked to the CBOE Volatility Index (better known as the VIX), just to name a few. And for all the talk about saturation in the ETF industry, most of the funds launched last year performed pretty well (see the top ten most successful new ETFs from 2009). At the recent Inside ETFs Conference in Florida, nearly every [...]

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This Week In ETFs: October 9th Edition

Eric Dutram — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 18:50:25 +0000

It’s been an interesting week the world of ETFs: Gold finished the week around $1045/oz and President Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize. Here are the ETF Database staff picks of the week’s most important and interesting stories from around the Web: 3 Strategies for Protecting Against a Depressed Dollar at ETF Guide: This article gives investors three great ways to protect yourself against a falling dollar with ETFs. The author likes foreign inflation protected bonds because they are so prevalent throughout the rest of the world; nearly 2/3 of all inflation protected bonds are foreign securities including SPDR’s WIP. As we have seen in early 2009, metals can also be a great hedge against a falling dollar, especially precious metals such as gold and silver. Lastly, currency ETFs offer investors the chance to either short the dollar with funds like UDN or purely invest in other foreign currencies with [...]

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Five ETFs Most Investors Don’t Understand

Michael Johnston — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:48:59 +0000

The majority of ETFs on the market follow the traditional ETF model – tracking an underlying equity or bond index. But as the benefits of the ETF structure become more widely accepted, inflows from increasingly sophisticated have created a demand for increasingly complex funds. Here are five of the more complex ETFs available to investors today, along with explanations of their objectives and strategies. PowerShares S&P 500 BuyWrite Portfolio (PBP): This ETF is based on the CBOE S&P 500 BuyWrite Index, which measures the rate of return of an S&P 500 covered call strategy. This strategy consists of holding a portfolio indexed to the S&P 500, and selling a series of call options, each with an exercise price at or above the current level of the S&P 500. Selling options hedges downside risk if the market falls (since the ETF receives premiums from options that are out-of-the-money), but limits upside returns if [...]

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ETF Database » LSC

Four ETFs That Have Held Their Ground During Crisis

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Using ETFs To Access Alternatives

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Ten Worst Performing ETFs Of 2010

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Five Things BusinessWeek Didn’t Tell You About Commodity ETFs

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Five ETFs To Give Your Portfolio Much-Needed Diversification

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Ten Commodity ETFs Every Investor Should Know (But Most Don’t)

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Seven Most Anticipated New ETFs Of 2010

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This Week In ETFs: October 9th Edition

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Five ETFs Most Investors Don’t Understand

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