Long-battered financial and real estate exchange-traded funds attracted investor interest in August, as mid-cap and small-cap ETFs also garnered increased interest from investors.
ETF investors traded the
iShares Dow Jones U.S. Financial Sector ETF
(IYF) - Get Report
at a pace of slightly more than $1 billion a day, on average, during the month. The fund jumped to 15th in August in terms of average daily dollar volume from 49th in July. It rose 0.05% in August, but remains down 22.3% year to date.
IYF's largest holdings include financial mainstays
JP Morgan Chase
(JPM) - Get Report
,
Bank of America
(BAC) - Get Report
,
Citigroup
(C) - Get Report
and
Wells Fargo
(WFC) - Get Report
.
The
iShares Dow Jones U.S. Real Estate ETF
(IYR) - Get Report
rose to 18th most active in August in terms of average daily dollar volume from 29th most active in July. It gained 1.8% in August. The ETF remains 1.4% lower year to date.
The small cap
iShares Russell 2000 ETF
(IWM) - Get Report
traded at an average pace of $8.65 billion a day, on average, during August, lifting it to second place from fourth among ETFs.
The accompanying table of the 20 most popular ETFs in August also shows that while the value of the
streetTRACKS Gold Trust ETF
(GLD) - Get Report
sank 9.3% during the month, it traded at an average daily volume of $1.35 billion. That placed it 10th highest in average daily dollar volume, an improvement from 24th place in July.
The
SPDR Mid Cap 400
(MDV)
advanced to 20th from the 33rd position by trading at an average daily volume of $804.8 million.
Remaining at the top of the list was the
SPDR S&P 500 ETF
(SPY) - Get Report
, whose shares traded at an average rate of $26.57 billion per day in August. Its top holdings include blue chips
Exxon Mobil
(XOM) - Get Report
,
General Electric
(GE) - Get Report
,
AT&T
(T) - Get Report
and
Microsoft
(MSFT) - Get Report
.SPY climbed 1.6% in August but still remains 11% down in 2008 to date.Third most popular ETF in August was the
PowerShares QQQ
(QQQQ)
, whose top holdings, in addition to Microsoft, include
Apple
(AAPL) - Get Report
,
Qualcomm
(QCOM) - Get Report
and
(GOOG) - Get Report
.
Richard Widows is a senior financial analyst for TheStreet.com Ratings. Prior to joining TheStreet.com, Widows was senior product manager for quantitative analytics at Thomson Financial. After receiving an M.B.A. from Santa Clara University in California, his career included development of investment information systems at data firms, including the Lipper division of Reuters. His international experience includes assignments in the U.K. and East Asia.
