Recently, SPDR launched two new ETFs and Goldman Sachs launched another. These ETFs offer deeper access into the Financial Services, Real Estate and Emerging Markets sectors. ETF Database offers insight into the construction and outlook for these new exciting ETFs.
A New Way to Invest in the Financial Sector
SPDR recently expanded their Select Sector SPDRs ETF family with a new ETF that offers exposure into the Financial Services industry. The Select Sector SPDR Trust – The Financial Services Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLFS ) is an ETF which provides exposures to the following sectors:
- Diversified banks 36.32%
- Multi-sector holdings 10.67%
- Asset management & custody banks 8.84%
- Regional banks 7.13%
- Investment banking & brokerage 6.77%
- Property & casualty insurance 6.52%
- Life & health insurance 6.52%
- And others 17.23%
Each of the components in the XLFS are from the S&P 500 Index. Some of the largest companies that make up this ETF are:
- Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Class B 10.38%
- Wells Fargo 10.18%
- JP Morgan Chase 9.59%
- Bank of America 6.88%
- Citigroup 6.45%
XLFS gives investors a new way to invest in the financial sector. As you can see from the description above XLFS expands the scope of investment in the financial sector. Not only do investors gain exposure to banks, they gain exposure into insurance companies, investment trusts and even conglomerates that are active in more than one sector.
Pure Investment in Real Estate, with Less Risk
SPDR released another groundbreaking ETF, The Select Sector SPDR Trust – Real Estate Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLRE ), that gives investors access to the entire real estate sector. The fund invests in major sectors of real estate:
- Specialized REITs 30.05%
- Retail 23.09%
- Residential REITs 15.35%
- Health care REITs 12.13%
- Office 9.95%
- industrial REITs 4.50%
- Hotel & resort REITs 2.86%
- Real estate services 2.07%
Notably, the fund does not invest in mortgage REITs, which should give investors a sigh of relief. Many mortgage REITs took a hard hit during the real estate crisis of 2008 and excluding these mortgages decreases risk to investors. Each of the components in the XLRE are from the S&P 500 Index. Among the largest components of XLRE are:
- Simon Property 12.67%
- American Tower 8.41%
- Public Storage 6.73%
- Equity Residential 5.89%
- Crown Castle 5.72%
XLRE is for investors who want diversified exposure into the real estate market, but don’t want to be exposed to mortgage holder credit risk or homebuilders. The fund is a pure real estate investment and profits from income streams created by developing and selling new real estate or renting space to others.
Emerging Market Exposure with the Best in The Business
Goldman Sachs has a great reputation on Wall St. for making money and money is everything on Wall St. Recently Goldman released a new ETF, The Goldman Sachs ActiveBeta Emerging Markets Equity ETF (GEM ), that is focused on emerging markets. The funds weights by region are:
- Asia ex-Japan 66.4%
- Europe, Middle East, Africa 19.2%
- Latin America 14.3%
- Cash 0.10%
The Fund has no more than 3.1% holding (Samsung Electronics Co Ltd being the largest holding of 3.1%) in any one security and has a weighted average market cap of $40 Billion. GEM targets companies that show, good value, strong momentum, high quality and low volatility. The fund is diversified across many different sectors:
- Financials 26.5%
- Consumer Staples 13.4%
- Information Technology 13.4%
- Telecommunication Services 9.4%
- Consumer Discretionary 9.3%
- Industrials 6.1%
- Energy 6.0%
- Materials 5.5%
- ETF 5.1%
- Healthcare 2.7%
- Utilities 2.4%
- Cash 0.1%
The Goldman Sachs GEM fund is a great way to gain stable exposure into emerging markets. The fund has strict management rules that constantly scan the globe for good investment opportunities and provide investors with a singular way to invest in the best companies that the emerging markets have to offer.
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
