Global ETF News Older than One Year
ETFS Research Update - Gold: New Year, New Record?
February 9, 2012--The gold spot price saw its 11th consecutive annual increase in 2011, its longest unbroken rise since its post-Bretton Woods free-float in the early 1970s.
The gold price also set a record by rising above US$1,920/oz last year. Despite the strong performance, the gold spot price ended 2011 below US$1600/oz as a result of exceptionally volatile trade, with prices dropping through their 200 day moving average trend line for the first time since the 2008 credit crisis. Gold futures net long speculative positioning hit its lowest level in over 2 years at the end of 2011. With gold having seen a more than 10% decline since its highs last year, some investors are questioning whether the best is now behind us. In this note we examine the key drivers of the gold price, recent events and likely scenarios in 2012.
Recent Gold Price Trends
Futures net long positioning near two year low
Gold price back up above its 200 day moving average
Central bank buying highest since 1970s
visit www.etfsecurities.com for more info.
Source: ETF Securities
Eurex to introduce new trading system in Q4 2012
Phased migration approach/ Customers to benefit from minimized latency, maximized throughput and greater flexibility
February 9, 2012---Eurex announced today its plan to launch a completely new trading system. Subject to the required legal approvals, first roll-out is currently scheduled for December 2012, followed by a migration phase, where products will be moved in a stepwise approach from the current to the new trading system.
It will be developed internally and based on Deutsche Börse Group’s proprietary global trading architecture, which is already in use at the International Securities Exchange (ISE).
Participants of Eurex will benefit from state-of-the-art technology which is built on the four pillars performance, efficiency, capacity, and reliability. The new technology will meet user needs by minimizing latency, maximizing throughput and allowing for greater flexibility while maintaining high standards of reliability. With the new trading system, Eurex will cease to use the currently used MISS infrastructure and VALUES API interface.
Source: Eurex
NYSE Euronext Activity Report on ETFs - January 2012
February 8, 2012--Listings
Last month, NYSE Euronext welcomed 1 new ETF listing from Amundi IS:
ETF Symbol:AA13
Listing date:26/01/2012
ETF Trading name:Amundi ETF Eurozone Highest Rated Govt EuroMTS 1-3
Underlying index: EuroMTS Highest-Rated Gvt 1-3Y
In total, NYSE Euronext had 684 listings of 586 ETFs from 16 issuers.
Trading activity
NYSE Euronext ETF markets experienced a slow start of the year with overall trading volumes down from 2011's levels:
The average daily value traded on-book last month was €265.6 million, down 43.2% vs. January 2011. The total traded on-book value amounted to €5.8 billion, down 3.4% month-on-month.
An average of 7731 on-book trades (single counted) were executed daily last month, up 2.6% vs January 2011.
A total of €1.1 billion was exchanged in block trades in January, up 21.9% from the €930.5 million last month. Overall, block trade volume represented 9.4% of total regulated market ETF trading on NYSE Euronext.
Assets Under Management (AUM)
At the end of January 2012, the combined AUM of all ETFs listed on the NYSE Euronext European markets totaled €143.1 billion, an increase of 1.5% from the €140.8 billion at the end of January 2011.
Compared with December 2011, there was a significant increase of 12.8% in AUM.
Source: NYSE Euronext
Dow Jones Indexes to license Dow Jones Global Titans 50 Volatility Risk Control Indexes to J.P. Morgan and Barclays Capital
New Index Series Targets Predetermined Levels of Market Volatility
February 8, 2012--Dow Jones Indexes, a leading global index provider, today announced that it has agreed to license the new Dow Jones Global Titans 50 Volatility Risk Control Indexes for trading to J.P. Morgan and Barclays Capital.
The Dow Jones Global Titans 50 Volatility Risk Control Indexes, also launched today, includes two gauges targeting predetermined levels of market volatility (10% and 15%) by dynamically allocating between a cash component and an underlying index; the underlying index is the Dow Jones Global Titans 50 Index, which represents 50 of the world’s largest stocks.
“Given the skittish markets in 2011, it’s understandable there is demand for index products that are able to capably target a volatility level for a defined equity basket,” said Mike A. Petronella, President, Dow Jones Indexes. “We believe these new indexes will serve as useful and reliable tools for those seeking to assess risk.”
Source: Dow Jones Indexes
'Perfect World' Eludes Regulators in Aligning Global Swaps Rules
February 8, 2012--The potential for U.S. and foreign regulations to reach across national borders and create overlapping or conflicting rules is gaining urgency as global authorities seek to complete rules this year to prevent a repeat of the 2008 credit crisis.
The U.S. is facing increasing criticism from Canadian, British and European Union regulators over the possibility that the Volcker rule ban on proprietary trading would restrict foreign sovereign debt markets while exempting U.S. government debt. At the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, meanwhile, regulators are facing pressure from JPMorgan Chase & Co., Barclays Capital and foreign regulators to limit the international reach of Dodd-Frank Act derivatives regulations.
Source: Bloomberg
NASDAQ OMX Data Center Expands Power and Connectivity Offerings
Access Services Offers Innovative Super Cab and 40G Client Connectivity
Only Exchange to Provide Highest Cabinet Power, Fastest Access, and Highest Bandwidth
February 7, 2012--The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc. (Nasdaq:NDAQ) today announced two new Access Services offerings, Super Cab and 40G Client Connectivity, which provide NASDAQ OMX Data Center customers with the highest cabinet power, fastest access and highest bandwidth available in an exchange's co-location facility.
The launch of Super Cab is effective immediately and 40G Client Connectivity will launch subject to filing with the Securities Exchange Commission.
Super Cab provides customers at the NASDAQ OMX Data Center with up to 17 kilowatts of power to operate and cool trading equipment within a single cabinet. This is the highest cabinet power available at any exchange's data center. NASDAQ OMX Access Services will utilize an innovative cabinet cooling design that draws the hot equipment exhaust into a custom cabinet chimney for maximum power at a high efficiency level. Super Cab provides customers with efficiencies in their co-location infrastructure. The solution also reduces cabinet-to-cabinet connectivity latency and maintains reliability with fully redundant power capacity.
Source: NASDAQ OMX
OECD-Green Growth: Making it Happen
February 7, 2012--Faced with low growth, high unemployment and weakened public finances countries need to pursue new sources of growth to put the global recovery back on track. Green growth can help. With the right policies to encourage innovation and stimulate new markets, it can boost productivity, spur growth and jobs, and change our behaviour as consumers.
Green growth can also mobilise revenues in ways that do not undermine the economic recovery, while eliminating wasteful and environmentally harmful spending.
But what is new about green growth? Since the Rio Earth Summit twenty years ago, we have known that green and growth must go together. What is different now? Let me give you a simple answer: green growth is not about replacing sustainable development with a new paradigm. It is instead an approach that can contribute to the successful implementation of sustainable development through concrete policy action by governments and stakeholders. Green growth is a practical and flexible approach for making progress along the economic and environmental dimensions of sustainable development, while taking full account of the social consequences of greening the growth dynamics of our economies. Green growth strategies focus on ensuring that natural assets can deliver their full economic potential. That includes the provision of basic services – clean air and water – and the resilient biodiversity and ecosystems needed to support food production and human health.
Source: OECD
ETFS US Precious Metals Weekly:Palladium highest in over 3 months as payrolls paints brighter US growth picture, South African mine issues flare
February 6, 2012--Palladium prices pushed towards their highest level since Q3 2011 as stronger than expected US payrolls data continued the recent
run of upbeat US data. The data reinforce recent strengthening
manufacturing activity indicators, bolstering the ‘white’ industrially
focussed precious metals of silver, platinum and palladium.
All the precious metals had already seen double digit growth by the end of January as the Fed underscored its commitment to keeping interest rates low into 2014 to underpin the nascent recovery in the US.
Gold touches 10 week high as market finds no respite from Greek debt worries, US geological survey data shows stagnating mine supply over the past decade. The metal moved up above $1730/oz last week, although early gains were tempered by a stronger USD on the US employment numbers. Gold continues to receive support from lingering debt uncertainties in Greece, underpinning interest in ‘hard assets’ such as gold as a hedge against tail event risk from a disorderly Greek debt default. US geological survey data released in January show annual global gold mine production increased just 5% in the decade ended December 31 2011, reflecting increasingly fractured mine supply as large high grade ore deposits in areas such as South Africa have been depleted.
Mining constraints in platinum flare with mass firing at the world’s largest platinum mine, and no.1 miner South Africa mulls 50% capital gains and resource rent taxes as alternatives to nationalization. Impala Platinum, producer of around 25% of annual global mine supply, announced last week that it had fired 17,200 workers in response to an illegal pay strike at its Rustenburg mine. Meanwhile a study by ruling African National Congress (ANC) proposed a 50% resource rent tax, in addition to a one–off 50% capital gains tax, in the world’s largest platinum producing country. The ANC has been exploring alternatives to calls within the party for the full nationalization of mining.
visit www.etfsecurities.com for more info.
Source: ETF Securities
ETFs Draw Highest Flows in 16 Months: BlackRock
February 6, 2012--Exchange-traded funds in January attracted the most money in 16 months, driven by record deposits to bond ETFs.
Investors poured $34.1 billion into ETFs worldwide, the most since September 2010, according to data compiled by New York-based BlackRock Inc. (BLK), the industry’s largest provider. Fixed-income ETFs gathered $9.1 billion, compared with the previous high of $6.7 billion in January 2009.
The popularity of low-cost index-based strategies surged among bond investors in the past year as yields hovered near record lows and some top long-term performers, including Bill Gross at Pacific Investment Management Co., trailed markets. Assets in bond ETFs, including exchange-traded notes and trusts, have more than quadrupled since the beginning of 2008 to $271 billion, BlackRock data show.
Source: Bloomberg
Emerging Market Currencies See Best Rally In Two Decades -SocGen
February 3, 2012--Sharp rallies in many emerging-market currencies last month appear to be more than just a seasonal surge, with some currencies in the developing world having their strongest January in over two decades, data compiled by Societe Generale showed.
However, the French bank also warned that it may be too early to expect another leg higher in this rally as restructuring talks between Greece and its private creditors, together with a new bailout deal for the debt-stricken Mediterranean country, hang in the balance.
The Mexican peso and Indian rupee, both of which notched up gains in excess of 6% against the dollar last month, had their strongest January since 1991, Societe Generale said. The Brazilian real and Colombian peso follow closely, experiencing their best January in 19 years.
Source: FT.com
