Traditional hours for U.S. equity markets are from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., but plenty of trading occurs in pre- and post-market hours. Brokerage giant TD Ameritrade is expanding on that by making a dozen ETFs available to trade 24 hours per day on weekdays.
“The second-biggest discount broker now lets customers buy and sell 12 U.S. exchange-traded funds 24 hours a day on weekdays,” reports Bloomberg. “Clients in Asia will be among the beneficiaries, gaining the ability to trade U.S. products during their daylight hours. But Americans wanting to key off late-breaking news can participate, too.”
The iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (NYSEArca: TLT) is the lone fixed income fund among the 12 TD Ameritrade is making available for 24-hour trading. Several commodities funds are in the group as well, including the SPDR Gold Shares (NYSEArca: GLD) and the iShares Silver Trust (NYSEArca: SLV).
The United States Oil Fund (NYSEArca: USO), which tracks West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures, and the United States Natural Gas Fund (NYSEARCA:UNG) will also be available for 24-hour trading.
“Initially, TD Ameritrade clients can trade 12 widely held ETFs including funds that track the S&P 500 Index and Dow Jones Industrial Average, Chinese shares and commodities. The company said it plans to offer more securities later,” according to Bloomberg.
TD Ameritrade will make the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (NYSEArca: SPY), the world’s largest ETF, available for 24-hour trading. Other equity ETFs on the list include the PowerShares QQQ (NasdaqGM: QQQ), which tracks the tech-heavy Nasdaq-100 Index; and the iShares Russell 2000 ETF (NYSEArca: IWM).
Previously, some investors have expressed concern regarding the inability to transact in some international ETFs while those markets are open. That is particularly true of emerging markets as most member countries in the MSCI Emerging Markets Index are closed for the entirety of the U.S. trading day.
However, a new avenue for sourcing liquidity could be available for the iShares MSCI Emerging Markets ETF (NYSEArca: EEM) and the iShares China Large-Cap ETF (NYSEArca: FXI) are being made available for all-day trading by TD Ameritrade.
Tom Lydon’s clients owns shares of GLD, QQQ and SPY.