Commodities have been on a wild ride in the past few months, particularly oil and natural gas. Oil has gone from $70 to $80 and back to $70 in less than 2 months, while natural gas has tanked, going from $7 in mid-December to $2 today. What's going on? Join us Monday at 1:10 PM on ETF Edge when our guests will be John Love, President and CEO, United States Commodity Funds, who runs the largest oil and natural gas ETFs, and Sal Gilbertie, CEO of Teucrium, which has a suite of ETFs around wheat, corn, soybeans and other agricultural products. ETFEdge.cnbc.com.
An evening of glamour and ETFs. Earlier this week, etf.com hosted its ninth annual awards night – honoring the performance of top funds and contributions made by many heavy-hitters in the ETF space. Roughly 250 members of the ETF community were in attendance at the event, held at the bedazzled Tribeca Rooftop in Manhattan. Among the winners of the so-called "ETF Oscars" were Joanne Hill, who won this year's Lifetime Achievement Award – chief advisor for research and strategy at Cboe Vest, board governor for the CFA Institute and a lifelong pioneer of the ETF industry. Other big winners included the JPMorgan Equity Premium Income ETF (JEPI) – for ETF of the Year and the U.S. Treasury 3-Month Bill ETF (TBIL), who took home Best New ETF. Dimensional and Bondbloxx also went away with big wins – including ETF Issuer of the Year and New ETF Issuer of the Year, respectively.
Short sellers tighten their grip on regional banks & China-heavy ETFs. As investors wade through the mire from the regional banking fallout, short interest is on the rise. More of them are placing bearish bets on the SPDR S&P Regional Banking ETF (KRE) – which saw short interest as a percentage of shares outstanding rocket up to 96% from a week ago. There's even been talk of banning short sales again a la the 2008 financial crisis, but history argues against it. Beyond just the banks, another area seeing high short interest is China-heavy emerging market ETFs – particularly the Vanguard FTSE Emerging Markets ETF (VWO) – in light of a rocky reopening story for the world's largest economy.
More crypto products in the pipeline overseas. German-based DWS is teaming up with U.S.-based Galaxy Digital to develop a "comprehensive" range of new crypto exchange-traded products targeting European investors.
Fed impact on homebuilder ETFs. Could a "one-and done" monetary policy move help fuel further big gains for the homebuilder trade? After losing big last year, builder ETFs like the iShares U.S. Home Construction ETF (ITB) and SPDR S&P Homebuilders ETF (XHB) are enjoying hefty rebounds in light of more rate clarity and stability.
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