This Week's ETF Winners & Losers

Exchange-traded funds tracking financial names were among the worst decliners of a holiday-shortened week on Wall Street following more disappointing writedown news and several credit downgrades.

For the week, the iShares S&P Global Financials (IXG Quote) ETF eased 3% to $79.67. The iShares Broker-Dealers (IAI Quote) ETF slumped 1.6% to $50.81. The Financial Select Sector SPDR (XLF Quote) ETF lost 1.5% to $28.86.

On Wednesday, Goldman Sachs increased its writedown projections for Citigroup (C Quote), Merrill Lynch (MER Quote) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM Quote). The firm now expects a combined $33.6 billion in fourth-quarter writedowns to be announced.

During the same trading session, Fitch Ratings said it placed the credit ratings for residential mortgage-backed securities backed by bond insurers on watch for a possible downgrade. Among those that could be affected are securities insured by MBIA (MBI Quote), Ambac Financial (ABK Quote) and Security Capital Assurance (SCA Quote).

Homebuilders also finished lower for the week. On Friday, the Census Bureau said that new-home sales plummeted 9% last month to 647,000 annualized units. Making things worse was news that new-homes inventory rose to 9.3 months.

The iShares Dow Jones U.S. Home Construction (ITB Quote) ETF gave back 4.7% to $17.25. The SPDR S&P Homebuilders (XHB Quote) ETF lost 3.1% to end the week at $18.87.

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