2 ETFs Do Well Without Financial Stocks

Thus far DOO has been helped only modestly by excluding financials; year to date it is down 10% versus 15% for EFA. Where I think this will become important is when European stocks start to recover and the other sectors leave the financials behind.

There are still some segments in the financial sector that are not in the obvious line of fire of the European banking crisis that El-Erian is calling for or largest U.S. banks which show no signs of fundamental recovery.

The segment getting most attention in this regard has been the Canadian banks, including Bank of Nova Scotia (BNS), Royal Bank of Canada (RY) and Toronto Dominion (TD). I also believe that the Chilean banks like Santander de Chile (SAN) and Banco de Chile (BCH) will continue to do quite well. The yields from both Canadian and Chilean banks are quite generous and the balance sheets are healthier than most U.S. banks.

One other segment whose business model is intact is the publicly traded exchanges. There are many of them trading in the U.S. and foreign markets, why there is no ETF focusing on these is a mystery to me. NYSE Euronext (NYX) yields a surprisingly high 4.3% and ASX Limited (ASXFY), the Australian stock exchange, yields over 6%. Exchange stocks will not offer a place to hide in the face of a global bear market but increased trading volume is good for business which allows the fundamentals to remain healthy.

At the time of publication, Nusbaum said BNS and SAN were client holdings.

Roger Nusbaum is a portfolio manager with Your Source Financial of Phoenix, and the author of Random Roger's Big Picture Blog. Under no circumstances does the information in this column represent a recommendation to buy or sell stocks. Nusbaum appreciates your feedback; click here to send him an email.

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