Claymore Enters the ETF Arena

By Staff Writer

November 01, 2006 at 02:00 AM

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Another flurry of exchange-traded funds has hit Wall Street in the form of five funds from ETF industry newcomer Claymore Securities and another five under the familiar name of Barclays Global Investors.

Claymore's offerings are relatively specialized. For example, the Claymore BNY BRIC (Amex: EEB) shadows the Bank of New York BRIC Select ADR index, which consists of companies from the emerging economies of Brazil, China, India and Russia. The other Claymore funds are focused on dividends, market sector rotation and overlooked stocks: respectively, the Claymore Zacks Yield Hog (Amex: CVY), Claymore Zacks Sector Rotation (Amex: XRO), the Claymore Sabrient Insider (Amex: NFO) and Claymore Sabrient Stealth (Amex: STH) funds. All trade on the American Stock Exchange.

While Claymore is new to the U.S. ETF industry, it has $14 billion under management and has been actively involved in running closed-end funds. The firm also launched three Canadian ETFs on the Toronto Stock Exchange in September.

Barclays Global added five global sector ETFs to its iShares lineup. The new funds have annual expense ratios of 0.48 percent and target what the firm sees as an expanding market. "Global sector investing is a growing trend as advisors and investors realize that there's more to sector investing than focusing only on U.S. companies," explains Lee Kranefuss, CEO of BGI's intermediary and ETF business. The products track the global consumer discretionary (NYSE: RXI), consumer staples (NYSE: KXI), industrials (NYSE: EXI), utilities (NYSE: JXI) and materials (NYSE: MXI) sectors and trade on the NYSE.

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