Technically speaking, the S&P 600 Small Cap index officially begana long-term uptrend in May. If the bull market continues to have legs… and if money from the sidelines really does need to “catch up” to the market… might small companies shine the brightest light? We are providing you with 3 enlightening ETF features here on 10/20/2009: ETF Boom: An Industry [...] Continue Reading...
About a week after the March 2009 “bottom,” one of the most critical components for stock ETFs going forward had been ownership of cash-rich companies. While I didn’t advocate “cash on hand” as a stand-alone indicator, I did suggest that it was impossible to ignore the financial strength of big-cap tech. In fact, of the 15 companies with [...] Continue Reading...
At about this same time in 2008, nobody wanted to touch Financial ETFs… not even with OPM (”Other People’s Money.”) Yet, one year later, Financial ETFs have been top performers off the March lows. For believers that a broad market stock rally can continue, we’re checking in with various opinions on Financial ETFs today. Sensible or silly? Also, we’re revisting Canadian [...] Continue Reading...
Wall Street, “Main Street,” politicians and philosophers continue to debate the reason for the housing collapse/credit crisis/global economic pandemonium. The differences of opinion may rage on for decades. Unfortunately, it will always become a “which-came-first-chicken-or-egg” argument. Was it the ever-greedy chain of business people… from the greedy mortgage broker to the greedy lender to the greedy “Wall-Streeter” [...] Continue Reading...
One only needs to type “investing strategy” into Google to see the infinite number of ways that decisions are made. In the end, however, rational thought is often discarded during periods of intense volatility. And that can lead to ”selling low” and/or “buying high,” the exact opposite of what one should do. On Monday, October 19th, we look at ways [...] Continue Reading...
BRIC ETFs: Why China Is Still The Best “BRIC” in the Wall. Click here to listen to the show: 10-18-09 Continue Reading...
Who doesn’t appreciate a good analogy? State Street ETFs are to U.S. markets as Vanguard ETFs are to emerging markets. Put another way, iShares ETFs are to 30-year olds as Vanguard ETF are to teenagers. Yep… Vanguard ETFs are rapidly growing. Recent ETF inflow/outflow data for the first 3 quarters show that Vanguard picked up nearly $18 billion in [...] Continue Reading...
For decades, international markets followed the lead of the U.S. What’s more, the increased costs and volatility never seemed to be validated by subtantially greater gains. Yet, what if the global economy is truly recovering? What if foreign markets were truly capable of moving independent of U.S. woes? Would emerging markets be the only beneficiaries… or would [...] Continue Reading...
Wary of U.S. REITs and U.S. real estate-related ETFs. I know that I am. For instance, using Risk Grades standardized measure of volatility, the SPDR U.S. Dow Jones REIT Fund (RWR) registers 212 while the SPDR DJ International Real Estate (RWX) logs 117. That makes the U.S. REIT Fund 1.8x as volatile as the international counterpart. (Note: The S&P [...] Continue Reading...
Washington is discussing the possibility of a “trading tax.” If it were to occur, investors would need to become more tax-efficient. Enter ETFs. While some benchmark indexes that ETFs track have less turnover than others, most ETFs have less turnover than mutual funds. And that tpyically means less of a taxable impact. Find out what you need to know at [...] Continue Reading...
