The Market Vectors Egypt Index ETF (NYSEArca: EGPT) entered Monday with a year-to-date gain of 37.5% making the lone the Egypt ETF the second-best performer among single-country emerging markets ETFs this year.
Only the Market Vectors India Small-Cap Index ETF (NYSEArca: SCIF) has topped EGPT, but investors may want to wait on a pullback in the Egypt ETF before considering new positions. That despite a rally that has carried EGPT higher by nearly 6% over just the past month while the MSCI Emerging Markets Index is up 1.7% over the same period.
“EGPToffers a unique and easy way to access the Egyptian stock market. As of June 2014, MSCI classified Egypt as a secondary emerging market. The EEM, iShares MSCI EM ETF allocates roughly 0.16% towards the country so it’s a trace amount. Therefore, the ETF offers a great opportunity to EM investors to de-correlate from the wider MSCI EM Index,” according to Emerging Equity.
In June, Egypt dodged a demotion to frontier market status when index provider MSCI said it was no longer considering the North African nation for such a move.
“Following the substantial increase in Egyptian foreign currency reserves, MSCI also announced that it is no longer considering launching a public consultation on a potential exclusion of the MSCI Egypt Index from the MSCI Emerging Markets Index,” said MSCI in a statement.