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Bullish momentum returned on Wall Street today, pushing equities to the highest levels in almost three weeks as the Federal Reserve kicked off their two-day meeting to discuss its bond-buying program. In economic news, the consumer price index for May rose 0.1%, slightly below expectations. On the housing front, building permits fell in May, while housing starts rose 6.8% to 914,000 units, missing analysts’ expectations of a 950,000 figure [see The Cheapest ETF for Every Investment Objective]. Global Market Overview: XLI Rallies Alongside Industrials, VOX Pops As investors turned their attention to the Fed, all three major U.S. equity indexes rallied to close in positive territory. The Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF rose 0.87%, after its underlying index rallied 138.38 points. The S&P 500 ETF gained 0.79%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq ETF rose 0.81%. In Europe, markets were mixed ahead of the Fed’s press conference; the Stoxx Europe 600 slipped 0.1%. Meanwhile, Japan’s Nikkei Stock Average fell [...]Click here to read the original article on ETFdb.com.Related Posts:Daily ETF Roundup: Stocks End Week On A Strong Note, XLI RalliesDaily ETF Roundup: Dow Closes Above 15,000, VOX Rallies Alongside Telecom StocksDaily ETF Roundup: Stocks Close Lower On First Day Of Q2Daily ETF Roundup: Stocks End Lower After Fed MinutesDaily ETF Roundup: XHB Pops On Homebuilder Data, EWG Jumps On Bundesbank Outlook

Adam Weiss and James Crichton's hedge fund firm Scout Capital has filed a 13D with the SEC regarding shares of Tim Hortons (THI). Per the filing, Scout has revealed a 5.5% ownership stake in with 8.4 million shares. This marks a 271% increase in their position size since the end of the first quarter as they only owned 2.26 million shares then. The 13D was filed due to portfolio activity on June 6th. The fine print of the filing also outlines what Scout is trying to accomplish with their new activist position: Scout has "engaged and expect to continue to engage in discussions with senior management of the Issuer with respect to the Issuer’s optimal capital structure, capital expenditures, timing and magnitude of share repurchases, management compensation metrics, and technology investments, among other matters." Per Google Finance, Tim Hortons is "a quick service restaurant in North America. The Company’s menu includes premium coffee, espresso-based hot and cold specialty drinks, including lattes, cappuccinos and espresso shots, specialty teas, fruit smoothies, home-style soups, grilled Panini and classic sandwiches, wraps, hot breakfast sandwiches and fresh baked goods, including donuts." For more on this hedge fund, we highlighted a new stock Scout has been buying recently.

Alternative energy has been a hot button issue for the last 50 year,s and investors have always found a way to play this heated market. In the last decade, there has been the launch of a number of ETFs that offer a specialized basket of products for alternative energy exposure, with 12 of these funds still in operation today. Below we outline two green energy ETFs that have been battling for investor attention since inception: Powershares WilderHill Clean Energy Portfolio and Guggenheim Solar ETF   [Download How To Pick The Right ETF Every Time]. Meet the Competitors Holding between $172 million and $107 million in total assets under management each, these funds are easily the largest green energy funds currently on the market. PBW holds a mix of companies that are focused on greener and generally renewable sources of energy, as well as technologies that facilitate cleaner energy. TAN, on the other hand, [...]Click here to read the original article on ETFdb.com.Related Posts:Head-To-Head: Alternative Energy ETF SurprisesEarth Day Special: Definitive Guide To Clean Energy ETFsTen Of The Worst Performing ETFs Of The First QuarterSolar ETFs Off To A Not-So-Bright StartETF Plays Ahead Of G-20 Summit

With more information available and the ability to quickly trade options online, investors are becoming savvier with using options to speculate, hedge and create their own financial strategies using a combination of ETFs, options and other assets. Options are financial products that fluctuate based on an underlying asset, such as an ETF. The value of the option is determined by multiple factors, including the amount of time until the option expires, volatility in the underlying asset and the proximity of the option’s strike price to the underlying asset’s price. Option pricing models also give us “Greeks”- values used to determine how the underlying asset and option price are related. Learning to read an options table will provide more insight into these concepts and how they relate to option value. Be sure to also read What Every ETF Investor Needs To Know About Options for an introduction to options. Information Sources The [...]Click here to read the original article on ETFdb.com.Related Posts:Daily ETF Roundup: XHB Pops On Homebuilder Data, EWG Jumps On Bundesbank OutlookDaily ETF Roundup: Stocks End Week In The Red, IXC Slumps Alongside Energy SharesDaily ETF Roundup: FXG Pops On Safeway Acquisition, XLF Rallies7 Articles ETF Investors Must Read: 6/13Daily ETF Roundup: Dow Falls Below 15,000, XLY Slumps, TUR Jumps

Crowdfund real estate Locally own small projects Big parcels later

The crowdfunding phenomenon is now taking on real estate investing. Sites like RealtyShares and iFunding are enabling small-time retail investors to become silent partners in projects they could not otherwise afford. Passive investments in real estate have been around forever in the form of limited partnerships. Crowdfunding things like trust deeds just lowers the entry barrier. It does not change the threshold for due diligence. The key to success in real estate has always been location, location, location. A crowdfunding investor can only perform a minimal assessment of a property's value without physically visiting the property. Anyone can log on to Zillow and view the most recent valuations of neighboring properties, or check a parcel's assessed value at the county assessor-recorder's office. Those are beginning steps. The next steps involve property appraisals, traffic analysis, and other checks on the track record of property managers. Those things can be crowdsourced to some extent but there's no complete substitute for traditional on-site legwork. Investing in residential property since the housing bust poses additional challenges. Getting clear title is a problem if a home mortgage was bundled and changed hands several times. I can't know whether a given trust deed on a crowdfunding portal has title problems without checking with a title search company first. I am concerned that novice investors could be hurt by a severe downturn in the housing market just as they were hurt in the housing crash that started in 2006. Buying a share of a note secured by a trust deed is like becoming a hard money lender rather than a title owner. The investor owns a share of a syndicated loan, denominated in dollars as a fixed-income instrument that pays a predetermined yield. If the US economy experiences high inflation, those note owners will see the value of their note evaporate as the dollar loses its value. Meanwhile, the actual property owner (either through an LLP, private REIT, or whatever) laughs all the way to the bank at the stupidity of those crowdfunding note holders. That doesn't happen in normal times but these aren't normal times. I think crowdfunding would work best for small projects that members of a community can see firsthand. Urban farmers could form a land trust, for example, and crowdfund it to establish community gardens in a blighted urban neighborhood. Charities like Habitat for Humanity could crowdfund a housing project for a low-income buyer and hand them title when the project is done. The valuation for such projects would have fewer variables to calculate because they're brand new and presumably unencumbered with the problems of previous owners. Crowdfunding portals can eventually be useful for conventional real estate investors once the housing market stabilizes, with the median property value for a given metropolitan area at somewhere between 2x and 3x of the area's median income. I am looking forward to seeing miscellaneous real estate investments like liens and rights-of-way traded on crowdfunding portals. Investors who have neither the time nor skill to evaluate a crowdfunded real estate project can always choose a publicly traded REIT or real estate index fund (or ETF) instead. A widely held fund has two advantages over a single property. It has no entry barriers or limitations for non-accredited investors and it arbitrages away the location problem by holding a large number of properties. Maybe some sharp investment manager will crowdfund a private REIT.

U.S. equities got off to a relatively strong start as investors turned their attention to the Federal Reserve meeting later this week. In economic news, the New York Fed’s Empire State manufacturing index rose to 7.84 in June, indicating an expansion; analysts had expected a reading of zero. In a separate report, the NAHB/Wells Fargo homebuilder sentiment index soared to 52 in June, marking the first reading above 50 since April 2006 and the biggest jump since 2002 [see The Cheapest ETF for Every Investment Objective]. Global Market Overview: XHB Pops On Homebuilder Data, EWG Jumps On Bundesbank Outlook Recovering from earlier lows, all three major U.S. equity indexes rallied to close in positive territory. The Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF rose 0.74%, after its underlying index logged in its fifth-consecutive triple-digit move. The S&P 500 ETF gained 0.78%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq ETF rose 0.94%. In Europe, markets were broadly higher after Germany’s central bank reported [...]Click here to read the original article on ETFdb.com.Related Posts:Daily ETF Roundup: Buy The Rumor, Sell The TweetDaily ETF Roundup: Stocks Rebound From Worst One-Day Drop In 2013Daily ETF Roundup: Housing Data Brings Back The BullsDaily ETF Roundup: Bargain Shopping Euphoria Sparks Rally Daily ETF Roundup: Housing Soars, Earnings Miss

The Wolf of Wall Street movie trailer was just released. The movie is directed by Martin Scorsese and the screenplay is by Terence Winter (of Sopranos and Boardwalk Empire fame). It features Leonardo DiCaprio, Matthew McConaughey, and Jonah Hill as the main actors. We often like to highlight finance related movie trailers, but most of those films are dramas and serious in nature. The Wolf on Wall Street looks to be comedic to a degree and full of antics, as it is based on Jordan Belfort's book, The Wolf of Wall Street. In it, he writes about manipulating stocks in the 1990's at a brokerage firm. If you like Lamborghini Countaches, Ferrari Testarossas, a new song from Kanye West, and suits from the 90's, then this trailer is for you. In essence, this film is somewhat like the movie Boiler Room and should certainly enhance the great reputation Wall Street has with the rest of America /sarcasm. The Wolf on Wall Street movie trailer is embedded below: No release date yet, it just says "coming soon."

Active ETFs have grown in popularity over the last decade as a great alternative to the traditional assets. With the hands-on approach of a mutual fund but the aggressively cheaper price tag, these ETFs have been a strong hold in previous market conditions and today. With the end of the second quarter just around the corner, investors who are curious about this hybrid investment strategy should take a moment to look back at the best performing actively managed funds so far this year.  [For updates on all new ETFs, sign up for the free ETFdb newsletter]. Below, we look at a handful of actively managed ETFs that have surpassed all others since the beginning of 2013: TrimTabs Float Shrink ETF  UP 21.98%: This fund’s goal is to generate long-term returns in excess of the Russell 3000 Index while avoiding the volatility that can arise in the index. By investing in stocks with liquidity [...]Click here to read the original article on ETFdb.com.Related Posts:Complete List Of Active ETFsInternational Bond ETF Guide: All the Options For Ex-U.S. Fixed Income Exposure2011: A Year Of ETF FirstsGetting The Most Out Of Your Bond ETFsOctober ETF Roundup: Launches, Filings, and Closures

Exchange-traded funds have taken the market by storm, with more than $1.5 trillion in assets under management across more than 3,000 securities. These ETFs provide everyday investors with exposure to previously inaccessible corners of the market, while enabling them to build a diversified and low-fee stock portfolio both quickly and easily [see The Cheapest ETF for Every Investment Objective]. Consumer ETFs have become a popular way for investors to hedge a portfolio due to the relatively stable nature of consumer spending. For example, there’s little question that consumers will continue buying toilet paper from companies like Procter & Gamble Inc. (PG) or Kimberly Clark Corporation (KMB), even if the economy turns south. What’s the Appeal? Consumer spending drives approximately 70% of the U.S. gross domestic product (“GDP”), according to data from the World Bank, making consumer stocks an integral part of any diversified stock portfolio. But with so many moving parts [...]Click here to read the original article on ETFdb.com.Related Posts:Beyond XLY: Considering Consumer Discretionary ETFsETF Sector Rotation Strategies: Beyond The SPDRsETFs & Sector Rotation: Large Cap, Small Cap, Or International?Three Years Later: Best Performing ETFs Since Markets Bottomed Out3 Sector Rotation Strategies ETF Investors Must Know