The transportation can be a key bellwether when it comes to assessing the health of the economy—if products are moving, the economy is grooving. The same goes for China, which saw its transportation sector rise steadily during the month of December.
“China’s transportation industry expanded steadily in December 2019, an industry index showed Wednesday,” a China.org.cn report noted. “The China Transportation Services Index (CTSI) stood at 175.3 points in December 2019, up 5.3 percent year on year, according to the China Academy of Transportation Sciences.”
“The growth was slower than the 5.6-percent expansion registered in November 2019,” the report added. “The index incorporates the transport volume of passengers and cargo of various transportation means such as railways, highways, waterways and civil aviation. With 2010 as the base year and 100 points as the base points, the CTSI includes passenger transport and cargo transport as two sub-indexes. The index for passenger transport rose 0.8 percent year on year to 164.5 points in December 2019, while that for cargo transport stood at 181.4 points, up 7.7 percent.”
Traders looking to play the transportation sector can look at the Direxion Daily Transportation Bull 3X Shares (NYSEArca: TPOR). TPOR seeks daily investment results equal to 300 percent of the daily performance of the Dow Jones Transportation Average. The index measures the performance of large, well-known companies within the transportation industry.
A couple more broad transportation ETFs to look at that are non-leveraged:
- iShares Transportation Average ETF (NYSEArca: IYT): seeks to track the investment results of the Dow Jones Transportation Average Index composed of U.S. equities in the transportation sector. The underlying index measures the performance of large, well-known companies within the transportation sector of the U.S. equity market.
- SPDR S&P Transportation ETF (NYSEArca: XTN): seeks to provide investment results that correspond generally to the total return performance of an index derived from the transportation segment of a U.S. total market composite index. The index represents the transportation segment of the S&P Total Market Index (“S&P TMI”).
Airlines are a major mover for transportation ETFs and one specific ETF to follow is the US Global Jets ETF (NYSEArca: JETS). JETS seeks to track the performance of the U.S. Global Jets Index, which is composed of the exchange-listed common stock (or depository receipts) of U.S. and international passenger airlines, aircraft manufacturers, airports, and terminal services companies across the globe.
For broad market plays on China alone, check out the iShares China Large-Cap ETF (NYSEArca: FXI), iShares MSCI China ETF (NasdaqGM: MCHI) and KraneShares CSI China Internet ETF (NYSEArca: KWEB).
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