Van Eck, the ETF issuer behind international ETFs targeting several emerging and frontier markets, announced today the launch of the Egypt Index ETF (EGPT). The new fund is designed to track the performance of the Market Vectors Egypt Index, a benchmark measuring the performance of publicly traded companies that are domiciled and primarily listed on an exchange in Egypt or that generate at least 50% of their revenues in Egypt. EGPT joins existing Van Eck funds focusing on Vietnam, Indonesia, Poland, and Russia, among others. [click to continue…]
Total ETF assets grew by more than $240 billion in 2009, as funds continued to flow from traditional actively-managed mutual funds and issuers introduced more than 100 new products. Despite some suggestions that the a saturation point is nearing (or has perhaps even been passed), the ETF industry is poised to continue its rapid expansion in 2010, and is on pace to surpass last year’s new product total.
Many of the new funds launched this year have been instant hits, and the pipeline is full of exciting new products (see the Seven Most Anticipated New ETFs of 2010). In a new weekly feature on ETF Database, we take a look at some of the more interesting products currently awaiting approval and launch. First up are three international ETFs offering exposure to hard-to-reach regions of the world, including a frontier, emerging, and developed market. [click to continue…]
The beginning of December brought more good news for the ETF industry, as cash continued to flow in and innovative new products continued to gain traction with investors. It was an active week on Wall Street as well, with a pleasant surprise from the jobs front wrapping up a week that saw continued rises in [...]
News that the Egyptian President is visiting Washington to meet with President Obama is certain to be major news in the north African nation. But coverage of Hosni Mubarak’s trip to D.C. this week has been focused not on the topics to be covered with Obama (the two leaders will discuss the Middle East peace [...]
Many investors who had the resolve to keep their equity holdings in place as global markets plunged to new lows in the first few months of 2009 were the beneficiaries of a familiar gift from an old friend. Emerging markets, which have regularly enhanced investor returns in recent years (well, prior to 2008 at least) [...]
