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In July, the international market looked knackered by spiraling woes. Among these, mayhem in the Euro zone thanks to the nagging Greek debt deal drama and two massive crashes in the Chinese equities’ market hit headlines all over the globe. Meanwhile, a decent GDP report, improving labor and housing markets and a torrent of positive-looking earnings releases, especially in the all-important financial sector, made the U.S. market the sole shining star last month amid broad-based volatility. All these events set the stage for investors’ behavior toward investments across the broad. The ETF industry also witnessed meaningful asset growth last month (per etf.com ). Top Winners S&P 500 – The SPDR S&P 500 Trust ETF (NYSEARCA: SPY ) While steady U.S. growth has already impressed investors, the Fed’s reiteration of near zero interest rates at the end of the month resulted in strong inflows into the U.S. equity funds. The ultra-popular SPY led the way last month, gathering over $4.36 billion in capital. Not only SPY, other two popular S&P 500 ETFs namely the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (NYSEARCA: VOO ) and the iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (NYSEARCA: IVV ) also piled up assets in the month. While VOO accumulated $1.17 billion, IVV’s asset base grew $1.08 billion. Nasdaq – The PowerShares QQQ Trust ETF (NASDAQ: QQQ ) Another U.S. index that stayed high in the month was Nasdaq. With the economy gaining ground, cyclical sectors like technology are getting a nice boost. In fact, QQQ hit a new 52-week high on July 20, 2015. A few better-than-expected tech earnings at the start of the earnings season turned investors toward this product. QQQ garnered about $861 million in assets in July. Currency Hedged – The WisdomTree Europe Hedged Equity ETF (NYSEARCA: HEDJ ) The policy divergence stemmed from the looming Fed tightening and the easy money policies in the Euro zone made hedged European investments a compelling opportunity for U.S. investors. By this technique, strong dollar could not eat away the gains repatriated back home. This phenomenon, along with the easing Greek tension, instigated investors to pour about $1.21 billion (net) into HEDJ. U.S. Financial – The Financial Select Sector SPDR ETF (NYSEARCA: XLF ) The financial sector has set an upbeat tone this earnings season. Several factors including fewer litigation charges, effective cost control measures and modest improvement in core businesses has given Q2 earnings a boost and sent shares to the positive territory. QQQ gathered about $892.4 million in assets in July. Top Losers Emerging Market – The iShares MSCI Emerging Markets ETF (NYSEARCA: EEM ) A stronger dollar on speculations of a sooner-than-expected prospect of a Fed rate hike took a toll on the emerging market. Also, sharp sell-off in Chinese equities and downbeat economic readings soured investors’ sentiments over this popular emerging market ETF. The fund saw outflows of about $2.49 billion in July. Apart from emerging markets, the iShares MSCI EAFE ETF (NYSEARCA: EFA ) and the iShares MSCI All Country Asia ex-Japan Index ETF (NASDAQ: AAXJ ) also suffered from the same woes. EFA and AAXJ lost about $733 million and $314 million, respectively in the month. U.S. Small-Cap – The iShares Russell 2000 ETF (NYSEARCA: IWM ) This small-cap U.S. equities ETF lost about $1.17 billion last month. Though this spectrum of the stock market gave a stellar return in June, July proved unlucky. Gold – The SPDR Gold Trust ETF (NYSEARCA: GLD ) Gold has slipped to the level it saw five years back on stronger dollar, a still-muted inflationary backdrop worldwide and the slowdown in China, which is one of the largest consumers of gold. With Fed tightening looming large, gold is likely to prolong its decline in the coming months. So, investors dumped this product in July, resulting in about $1.11 billion in net outflows. China – The i Shares China Large-Cap ETF (NYSEARCA: FXI ) July was a month of massacre in China with its stock market rout wrecking havoc early and later on in the month. Heightened volatility, the still-high valuation and deepening economic crisis led Chinese equities to frequent crashes in July despite government intervention. Quite expectedly, the segment was mostly out of favor in the month, with FXI taking the sixth spot in the top 10 losers’ list. The fund shed about $513 million in assets. Link to the original article on Zacks.com Scalper1 News
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