Exchange traded funds (ETFs) hit the 1,000 mark last month. With new launches from providers like Grail, IndexIQ, Emerging Global Shares and another try by Northern Trust, it may not be long before the number of ETFs goes well beyond that.
Grail Advisors has selected Western Asset Management to be the subadvisor for its newest fund, the Grail Western Asset Enhanced Liquidity ETF. The fund is an actively managed short-term bond fund that will invest primarily in money market securities and short-term debt.
IMD Business School in Switzerland released its World Competitiveness Yearbook for 2010, which saw Taiwan jump from number 23 to number 8 in the world. In response, Index IQ has already jumped to the occasion and is introducing the IQ Taiwan Small Cap ETF (NYSEArca: TWON).[Other ways to access Taiwan with ETFs.]
The small-cap ETF is designed to provide additional Alpha exposure as a satellite holding built around an investor’s core equity portfolio and seeks to track, before fees and expenses, the performance of the IQ Taiwan Small Cap Index. Taiwan’s rapid industrial and economic development has earned the country the title, “Taiwan Miracle,” and it is considered one of the four Asian tigers. [China and Taiwan’s Improving Relationship.]