Alternative ETFs

An ETF for Rising Inflation

May 12, 2013

Low interest rates are starting to fuel an economic fire. In the financial markets, I believe low-yield alternatives are leading investors to pay up for less attractive dividend funds and junk bonds. (The Wall Street Journal said the same this week). In the housing market, low interest rates are pushing investors back into single family [...]

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Gold is Out – Is the Fear Trade Over?

April 14, 2013

This week gold entered bear market territory, plunging by more than 20% from the market highs set in 2011. Gold also lost its correlation to equities, seeing as the SPDR Gold Trust (GLD) is off by 10% while equities, as measured by the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY), are up 12%. Is the gold rush [...]

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Is This the Start of a Bear Market in Gold?

February 24, 2013

Famed investing legends are dumping their gold holdings. George Soros dropped his stash of gold (held in the popular SPDR Gold Trust (GLD)) while Louis Moore Bacon sold all of his gold holdings in his Moore Capital Management fund with the exception of a modest position in a physical gold ETF, Sprott Physical Gold Trust [...]

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The Buyback ETF that Crushes the Market Year After Year

February 5, 2013

With interest rates at record lows, corporate cash balances at record highs, and tax policy visibility as low as it could ever be, corporate spending on buybacks came in 50% higher in 2012 than the average in the preceding decade. The turn towards buybacks is clear; how it will affect total returns isn’t as certain. [...]

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Searching for the Best MLP ETF

January 13, 2013

Master limited partnerships are one of the fastest growing investments on Wall Street. Oil and gas companies divest high cost assets with MLP issues while investors find MLPs attractive for their high yields and tax benefits. Investors who favor sector ETFs as a way to get broad exposure have plenty of choice in master limited [...]

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IPO ETF Delivers Stellar Returns Despite Several IPO Flops

December 23, 2012

Despite well-known IPO disasters like Facebook (FB), the First Trust IPOX Index ETF (FPX) was the best performing of all strategy ETFs in 2012, delivering returns 8% higher than the S&P 500 after dividends. The ETF continues to test the idea that IPOs are much better for the business than they are investors. While the [...]

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Merger Arbitrage ETFs Just Got Better

December 16, 2012

The deals space is heating up – one analyst says to expect a $20 billion merger in 2013 – as companies think about how to use cash balances and low interest rates to their advantage. For investors, the question is how can one use this knowledge to make a profit. Fund managers think merger arbitrage [...]

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Low Volatility ETFs: Same Returns with Less Worry

December 9, 2012

If 2012 was the year of the dividend ETF, 2013 may be the year of the low volatility ETF.  The dividend play may be a bit skewed going into 2013 due to so many special dividends (here are a few special dividend announcements) being paid prior to year-end and a possible exodus from dividend payers [...]

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ETF Spotlight: PureFunds ISE Mining Service ETF (MSXX)

December 2, 2012

FactorShares, a company better known for exotic funds tracking the spreads between dissimilar asset classes (gold and stocks, for example), has launched a new fund tracking the mining service space. The new fund offers a new way to get exposure to a popular asset class – gold and silver bullion – by investing in companies [...]

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