On Monday we noted a pickup in options activity in RSX (Market Vectors Russia), which provides an opportunity for us to closely examine exchange traded funds with exposure to the country.
RSX is the giant in the space, having debuted back in April of 2007 and having amassed approximately $1.6 billion in assets while averaging about 4.8 million shares traded daily.
However, over time, a number of other approaches that also offer exposure to the Russian equity market have appeared in ETF form, starting with ERUS (iShares MSCI Russia Capped Index). Unlike RSX which tracks the DAXGlobal Russia Index, ERUS is based on the MSCI Russia Capped Index. RBL (SPDR S&P Russia) is yet another alternative, and it tracks the S&P Russia Capped BMI Index.
RSX, ERUS, and RBL are all large cap oriented, and that said, RSXJ (Market Vectors Russia Small Cap) offers exposure to the small cap segment of the Russian equity market.
Short term traders looking to leverage directional bets to the country specific ETF and/or hedge portfolios aggressively, will likely find appeal in RUSL (Direxion Daily Russia Bull 3x) and RUSS (Direxion Daily Russia Bear 3x) which track the DAXGlobal Russia Index from a 3 times daily leveraged long and short standpoint, respectively.