ETF Offers More Than Luxury Apparel

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Fashion Week in New York concludes this week, with the optimism of fashion houses reflected in a larger luxury apparel event than last year.

The ETF that best tracks the success of companies in the high-end apparel industry and the broader luxury sector is Claymore/Robb Report Global Luxury Index ETF(ROB).

Fashion exposure in the top 10 holdings of ROB comes from Polo Ralph Lauren(RL) and Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton, which each account for 4.5% of the fund.

There's much more to ROB than apparel though.

The top holding in the ETF is the Swiss watch company Swatch Group, which receives a 6.0% allocation. Luxury carmakers Daimler(DAI), Bayerische Motoren Werke (also known as BMW), and Porsche account for a combined weighting of 10.7%.

Small jet manufacturers such as the Brazilian company Embraer and the French firm Dassault Aviation account for a further 6.2%, while high-end hotels Mandarin Oriental, Shangri-La, and Wynn Resorts Ltd.(WYNN) have a combined weighting of 8.4%. The fund even allocates 3.3% to Northern Trust(NTRS), an asset management firm catering to wealthy families.

Ultimately, the outlook for these and the other luxury companies in ROB will depend on the sustainability of the global economic recovery.

The recovery of 2009 saw many luxury companies outperform the market and ROB increased by 48.7%, well ahead of the 26.3% gain in SPDR S&P 500 Index(SPY). As shoppers become more convinced that a double dip recession is not going to occur, the outlook for luxury companies will continue to improve, although some foresee trouble for the industry.