The Top Five ETFs This Past Month Are All Shorts

With all of the recent market volatility, we looked to see which exchange traded funds (ETFs) are holding up.  In looking at the performance over the past month, ETFscreen shows the UltraShort ETFs as the best performers.  These ETFs may not be for everyone, as they are risky.  Basically, they provide double the opposite of what the index is doing.

The top 18 performing ETFs are in the UltraShort category, and it isn’t until the 19th place that we see a regular ETF.  And even it is of a different breed, the PowerShares DB Oil Fund (DBO) tracks a futures-based index.

So what are those top performing ETFs and their performance for the past 30 days?

• ProShares UltraShort Semiconductor (SSG) 17.7%
• ProShares UltraShort Oil & Gas (DUG) 15.4%
• ProShares UltraShort Financials (SKF) 15.1%
• ProShares UltraShort SmallCap 600 (SDD) 13.3%
• ProShares UltraShort Russell 2000 Value (SJH) 12.5%
• PowerShares DB Oil Fund (DBO) 7.9% (19th place)