Over the past decade, China has become an incredible economic force, surging from an investment afterthought to one of the key nations for trade in the world today. The country is currently the world’s second biggest economy from a GDP perspective and exports more products, in dollar terms, than any other nation on earth. Yet, with incredible growth comes difficult choices as well; inflation in the country has begun to settle at uncomfortable levels with recent readings putting the year-over-year change above 6%. This high rate of price increases, coupled with China’s relatively lax response to the situation, is starting to creep into a number of other sectors and may be resulting in unintended consequences for the economy that could be far more severe than many analysts could have initially predicted. [click to continue…]
Over the past few years it has become increasingly clear that China is now the most important economy in the world. Though second to the U.S. in total size, China accounts directly for a significant portion of global GDP growth and has contributed indirectly to expansion in developed and emerging markets around the globe–particularly resource [...]
The month of May was a generally disappointing stretch for investors, as both international and domestic equity markets struggled to overcome obstacles new and old. Commodities, which had been a nice source of absolute returns for much of the last year, fell on hard times as well; precious metals went into a brief freefall, and [...]
As the world’s three key developed market zones–the U.S., the EU, and Japan–continue to struggle under the weight of mounting debt burdens, high unemployment, and slow growth environments, investors have made a rapid exodus out of “advanced” markets and into emerging markets that now account for the majority of global GDP growth. These nations generally [...]
As one of the primary causes of the recent financial crisis and economic downturn, real estate has been hit hard since 2008, with a variety of REITs struggling to find financing for new projects, tenants for old buildings, and the cash to pay for operations. While many names in this sector have plunged, others have [...]
The impact of the recent global economic slowdown was first felt by consumers around the world who were forced to cut back on purchases in order to endure the recession. While some consumer segments such as the wealthy, have begun to spend again, the events of the last two years have also had a profound, [...]
A number of statistical bulletins released in recent weeks have served as an excellent illustration of the ever-widening cap between the world’s emerging and developed economies. While the U.S. and Europe struggle to stay afloat and eke out positive GDP growth, the concern in China is very different. Beijing has been concerned in recent months [...]
Whenever a company prepares for a public offering, executives have been known to spend an inordinate amount of time choosing the combination of letters that will serve as the company’s ticker and often nickname within the investment community. To many, the fixation on selecting the perfect ticker seems like an irrational obsession on par with [...]
Historically, no portfolio was complete without a material allocation to real estate. Consistently high real returns and low correlations to stocks and bonds made it easy to overlook the out-of-whack fundamentals that ultimately led to an unprecedented collapse. But when real estate markets got a reality check in late 2008, many investors swore off the [...]
Following a year that saw some of the worst performances in recent memory, many asset classes have bounced back in 2009. But some have performed better than others, and as the year draws to a close we take a look at some of the best-performing ETFs. The year’s top gainers include a few of the [...]
On Tuesday, Claymore Securities launched its China Technology ETF (CQQQ), the first U.S.-listed ETF to focus on the Chinese technology sector. CQQQ joins three other China ETFs from Claymore (YAO, HAO, TAO) that have accumulated more than $500 million in aggregate assets. The new ETF will seek to replicate the AlphaShares China Technology Index, a [...]
