Tag Archives: brian-haskin

WisdomTree Makes Early Splash In 2016

Despite market volatility, 2016 looks to be a big year for WisdomTree (NASDAQ: WETF ). The New Year’s confetti had hardly been cleared when the firm announced it had completed its acquisition of GreenHaven Commodity Funds, the managing owner of the GreenHaven Continuous Commodity Index Fund (NYSEARCA: GCC ) and GreenHaven Coal Services. The news came on January 4, the first business day of 2016, and it was quickly followed up by another big announcement: the firm’s launch of a four-fund suite of dynamic currency-hedged ETFs: WisdomTree Dynamic Currency Hedged Europe Equity Fund (BATS: DDEZ ) WisdomTree Dynamic Currency Hedged Japan Equity Fund (BATS: DDJP ) WisdomTree Dynamic Currency Hedged International Equity Fund (BATS: DDWM ) WisdomTree Dynamic Currency Hedged International SmallCap Equity Fund (BATS: DDLS ) “WisdomTree’s dynamic currency hedged strategy limits the need to make a call on currency by utilizing a data-driven, rules-based approach that assesses the picture of developed market currencies relative to the U.S. dollar on a monthly basis,” said WisdomTree Director of Research Jeremy Schwartz, in a statement. “This offers the potential for an attractive strategic and baseline exposure for long-term portfolios.” Move Into Commodities The GreenHaven acquisition also involves alternative investment funds. In addition to the GCC ETF, WisdomTree’s acquisition of GreenHaven Coal Services also includes the GreenHaven Coal Fund (NYSEARCA: TONS ), which GreenHaven Coal Services sponsors. GreenHaven has been retained by WisdomTree as the sub-advisor to both funds. “The acquisition of these ETFs represents WisdomTree’s first foray into the commodities space and exemplifies our commitment to growing an innovative, differentiated and diversified product platform,” said WisdomTree CEO Jonathan Steinberg. “Today in the U.S. alone we offer 88 ETFs across traditional equities and currency-hedged equities, domestic and international fixed income, currencies, and alternatives strategies including commodities.” GCC returned -18.99% in 2015, a very tough year for commodities, ranking in the top 12% of its Morningstar category. TONS launched in February 2015 and returned -20.90% in the final six months of 2015, but that was good enough for it to rank in the top 1% of its category. The two funds have respective net-expense ratios of 0.85% and 1.23%. Three of the new currency hedged equity ETFs – DDEZ, DDJP, and DDLS – have net-expense ratios of 0.43%. DDWM has a net-expense ratio of 0.35%. Past performance does not necessarily predict future results. Jason Seagraves contributed to this article.

SilverPepper Posts Pair Of First-Place Finishes

Alternative mutual fund company SilverPepper prides itself on making “hedge fund strategies” available to “the rest of us.” The Lake Forest, Illinois-based firm has a number of investor-friendly videos at its website , and its marketing materials generally aim to entertain as well as inform. SilverPepper’s approach is working. The firm recently celebrated its second anniversary, and for the second straight year, two of its mutual funds had the honor of finishing first within their categories: the SilverPepper Merger Arbitrage Fund (MUTF: SPAIX ) was the top-performing merger-arbitrage mutual fund for the 12 months ending October 31, and the SilverPepper Commodity Strategies Global Macro Fund (MUTF: SPCIX ) finished first out of 157 funds in the “Commodities Broad Basket” Morningstar category. SPAIX also had a strong showing in comparison to funds in the broader Market Neutral category, finishing 11th out of 158 funds for the time period being considered. For the year ending December 31, 2015, the fund returned an impressive 8.49%, ranking in the top 3% of the broad category. SilverPepper president Patrick Reinkemeyer attributed the fund’s outperformance to “hedge fund expert” Steve Gerbel, who “controlled risk by avoiding failed mergers” and boosted returns by investing in smaller-cap companies “where regulatory hurdles tend to be less, yet merger spreads are typically wider.” SPCIX finished 1st out of 157 funds for the year ending Halloween 2015, but that doesn’t mean it actually generated positive returns for what was a tough 12 months for commodities. Nevertheless, it outperformed the category average by a whopping 14 percentage points, and over the next three months, its -0.80% return remained in the top 4% of the category. Mr. Reinkemeyer said fund manager Renee Haugerud “deserves credit” for “using her fingernails-in-the-dirt research to largely avoid some of the worst commodity sectors,” including oil, and “hedging its bets” as part of “an overt tactic to protect investors’ assets.” For more information, visit silverpepperfunds.com. Past performance does not necessarily predict future results. Jason Seagraves contributed to this article.

Reality Shares Builds Suite Of Dividend-Themed ETFs

Reality Shares, which launched its first ETF in late 2014, has followed up with an early 2016 launch of three similarly themed ETFs: Reality Shares DIVCON Leaders Dividend ETF (BATS: LEAD ) Reality Shares DIVCON Dividend Defender ETF (BATS: DFND ) Reality Shares DIVCON Dividend Guardian ETF (BATS: GARD ) The firm’s original ETF, the Reality Shares DIVS ETF (NYSEARCA: DIVY ), is described by the firm’s Executive VP Ryan Ballantyne as a “honey badger.” According to Morningstar, the fund’s NAV-based performance for 2015 was 2.24%, and ranked as the #1 ETF in Morningstar’s Multi-Alternative category. The new Leaders Dividend ETF is a long-only strategy “long only” and seeks to invest in large-cap U.S. companies with the highest probability of increasing their dividends within a year. The investment selection is based on Reality Shares’ proprietary DIVCON dividend health scoring system. Two Long/Short ETFs DFND and GARD, by contrast, employ long/short strategies that were first described in our October write-up on the funds’ pending launches. Both the Defender and Guardian ETFs track indices that are based on the idea that companies that increase their dividends tend to outperform the broad market, and companies that cut or suspend their dividends tend to underperform the broad market. Under Reality Shares’ proprietary methodology, the 500 largest U.S. companies are assigned ratings based on how likely they are to raise or cut their dividends, and selections for the long and short portfolios are made on these bases. The difference between the two ETFs is that while the Defender ETF always has both long and short exposure (75% long and 25% short), the Guardian ETF uses a dynamic hedge based on the company’s Guardian Indicator and may shift from 100% long exposure to a 50% long / 50% short position (a market neutral position) when the market is forecast to decline. Research Driven Indices All of Reality Shares’ dividend-themed ETFs follow the company’s custom DIVCON indices . The Reality Shares DIVS Index is the first index designed to isolate and capture dividend growth, rather than dividend income. For more information, visit realityshares.com . Past performance does not necessarily predict future results. Jason Seagraves contributed to this article.