When ProShares launched BITO, the Bitcoin Futures Strategy ETF last autumn, the ETF along with Bitcoin were promoted as “stores of value.” The rationale was that Bitcoin was independent of stock markets and would provide diversification away from equities and tend to rise when equity markets fell. Unconvinced, I wrote a column at that time … Read more
Last Tuesday was International Women’s Day. For the eighth straight year Women in ETFs, the standard bearer for promoting gender bias reform in the ETF industry, held bell-ringings and special programs around the world to commemorate the occasion. There have been a number of research studies demonstrating examples that having female representation in the C-Suite, … Read more
Two months ago, I noted that ValuEngine models were predicting a down market for 2022 and wrote a column on redeployment of core assets for investors with short-to-medium equity time horizons. The question for investors concerned with a downturn is what to do and if reallocation from assets committed to core equity is required, how … Read more
The trend is your friend. That is, until it isn’t. The list of best performing non-leveraged ETFs for the past 90-days is led almost exclusively by ETFs that hold the stocks of fossil-fuel-based energy and closely related companies. At the same time, the prices of ESG and more climate-focused impact ETFs have plunged dramatically. With … Read more
There is no sugarcoating it. January was a lousy month for the market. Many pundits are certain that this is the beginning of a yearlong downturn. Other experts are calling this a dip and a buying opportunity. Our models at ValuEngine are mixed with a six-month forecast on S&P 500 ETFs of +2.6% but a … Read more
Lost in all the market volatility and concerns about interest rate hikes and inflation was a regulatory ruling with major implications for asset capture in the ETF industry. The New York State Department of Financial Services is the state’s insurance regulator. In December it published a new regulation that, until Jan. 1, 2027, allows shares … Read more
Happy New Year! My previous column focused on the ValuEngine forecast targets for 6 Benchmark Index ETFs. To varying degrees, our models expect all of them to post negative price returns. The question for investors concerned with a downturn is what to do and, if reallocation from assets committed to core equity is required, how … Read more
A common toast has been: “May 2022 be better than 2021!” However, where the US Stock Market is concerned, most of us would gratefully accept a repeat of 2021’s returns. The ETF reports on ValuEngine.com for funds that follow market benchmarks provide a side benefit in writing market analyses. They are a window to implicit … Read more
Income-oriented investors disgusted by the pitiful yields available in US fixed income securities during the past five years have turned increasingly to dividend ETFs. However, in the ETF world, dividend-oriented ETFs and ETFs constructed to pay owners the highest possible dividend yields aren’t necessarily the same thing. Today, we’ll compare 5 dividend-oriented ETFs with very … Read more
This week’s featured ETF is GURU, Global X Guru Index based on a specific “smart money” hedge fund strategy. Guru’s site claims that the index engineered by Global X and provided by German customized index specialist Solactive AG allows everyday investors to access the high conviction investments among the largest, most sophisticated hedge funds in … Read more