It didn’t matter whether it was developed or emerging markets, all equity markets benefited from a strong 2019. This was made evident by data from the FTSE RIC Capped Index Series, which highlighted uniform positive returns from Russia (+53.4%), Switzerland (+33.5%) and Canada (+29.5%).
“Looking back, 2019 was a very strong but also quite an unusual year for the global equity markets,” said Rolf Agather, managing director, applied research, FTSE Russell. “Who could have foreseen a 53.4% return for Russia, or a 28.1% rise for Brazil? Investors enjoyed a year that saw a positive return for nearly every global equity market, however this will likely not be the case in 2020 as history has proven time and again that individual countries and regions can perform quite differently over time. This underscores the need for broad diversification across global markets with indexes an effective way for investors to capture precise market exposures.”
“The goal of our collaboration with FTSE Russell is to provide advisors and investors with the ability to access a comprehensive suite of non-US single country or regional ETFs across developed and emerging markets,” said Patrick O’Connor, head of global ETFs for Franklin Templeton. “This gives investors the tools they need to allocate both strategically and tactically to countries and regions in which they have strong conviction.”
Franklin Templeton offers 23 single country and regional ETFs based on the FTSE Global RIC Capped Indexes.
Given the positive gains in Russia, Switzerland and Canada, here are three ETFs to look at:
- iShares MSCI Russia Capped ETF (NYSEArca: ERUS): seeks to track the investment results of the MSCI Russia 25/50 Index. The index is designed to primarily measure the performance of equity securities listed on stock exchanges in Russia.
- iShares MSCI Switzerland ETF (NYSEArca: EWL): seeks to track the investment results of the MSCI Switzerland 25/50 Index. The underlying index is a free float-adjusted market capitalization-weighted index with a capping methodology applied to issuer weights so that no single issuer exceeds 25% of the underlying index weight, and all issuers with a weight above 5% do not cumulatively exceed 50% of the underlying index weight.
- iShares MSCI Canada ETF (NYSEArca: EWC): seeks to track the investment results of the MSCI Canada Custom Capped Index. The underlying index is designed to measure broad-based equity performance in Canada. The underlying index uses a capping methodology to limit the weight of any single issuer to a maximum of 25% of the underlying index. The underlying index will include large- and mid-capitalization companies and may change over time.
For more market trends, visit ETF Trends.