Wednesday marks the first day of trading for another Global X ETF, as the company introduced a fund offering exposure to a basket of preferred stocks from Canadian issuers that trade on the Toronto Stock Exchange. The Global X Canada Preferred ETF (CNPF) seeks to replicate the Solactive Canada Preferred Index, a benchmark that includes nearly 60 different preferred stock issues from companies operating in various sectors of the Canadian economy. Financials are the biggest allocation within the portfolio, making up nearly 75% of assets. Energy firms (10%), telecom companies (6%) and consumer discretionary companies (5%) make up the remainder of the exposure. [click to continue…]
iShares hasn’t launched any new ETFs since rolling out its short-term TIPS fund (STIP) in early December, but the issuer responsible for close to 45% of all U.S. ETF assets continues to expand its product pipeline. The San Francisco-based ETF giant recently detailed plans for a international preferred stock ETF in an SEC filing; the [...]
The first wave of growth in the ETF industry came as investors embraced the exchange-traded structure as an improvement over traditional actively mutual funds–a more cost-efficient and tax-friendly way to access traditional asset classes such as stocks and bonds. But in recent years much of the growth in ETF assets has been attributable to “democratizing” [...]
Recent growth in the ETF industry has been due in large part to surges in popularity of asset classes to which many investors would otherwise have fairly limited access. Exchange-traded commodity products have seen billions of dollars in cash inflows, as have fixed income and currency funds. While the number of ETFs offering exposure to [...]
As the ETF industry has expanded in recent years, so too has the number of asset classes accessible through exchange-traded products. With more than $2 billion in cash inflows in 2009, preferred stock ETFs have become a big hit with some investors, offering “hybrid” exposure that has delivered strong returns provided valuable diversification benefits to [...]
by Andy H on September 30, 2009
September was one of the most active months in the ETF industry in recent memory. We saw a wave of new fund launches from industry leaders and smaller players alike, along with perhaps the first of many commodity fund closures. September saw the introduction of another actively-managed ETF, proposals on several more innovative funds, and [...]
On Thursday, State Street launched the SPDR Wells Fargo Preferred Stock ETF (PSK), an ETF that invests in non-convertible preferred stocks. The new SPDR will compete with two existing products from iShares and PowerShares, both of which have been incredibly popular among investors through the first three quarters of 2009.
