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Top and Flop ETFs of Last Week

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Last week was all about central bank meetings, the signing of a historic deal between President Donald Trump and North Korea leader Kim Jong Un, the start of the 2018 FIFA World Cup and escalation of trade war fears. Overall, the big three ETFs S&P 500 based (SPY - Free Report) , Dow Jones Industrial Average-based fund (DIA - Free Report)  and Nasdaq-100 fund ETF (QQQ - Free Report)  gained 0.1%, lost 0.8% and added 1.5%, respectively.

Against this backdrop, below we highlight the best and worst performing ETFs of last week. 

Top ETFs

iShares Evolved US Media and Entertainment ETF  – Up 5.4%

The start of FIFA World Cup 2018 and U.S. cable operator Comcast’s CMCSA bid to acquire the film production and studio assets of Twenty-First Century Fox FOXA made this media fund a winner last week (read: Comcast Outbids Disney for Fox Assets: Media ETFs Surge).

Amplify Online Retail ETF (IBUY - Free Report) – 5.4%

U.S. retail sales rose the maximum in six months in May. Sales increased 0.8% sequentially in the month, after an upwardly revised 0.4% growth in April, handily beating market expectations of a 0.4% rise.

Even though brick-and-mortar retailers have been steady in recent times, the underlying trend is shifting toward online. Nonstore retailers continue to see a sales rise, having logged an expansion of 0.1% in May versus an increase of 1.5% registered in April. This clearly explains why IBUY was an investor favorite last week (read: May's Retail Sales Growth Highest in 6 Months: ETFs & Stocks).

iPath Bloomberg Cocoa SubTR ETN  – 5.1%

The underlying index of the fund measures the returns that are potentially available through an unleveraged investment in the futures contracts on cocoa. There has been a bounce in the cocoa market of late. While the concern that inclement weather will likely hurt crops in Ivory Coast was a reason, dealers said in early June that “the rise was partly a technical correction, with the market becoming oversold after a prolonged slide which has seen prices fall around 15 percent during the last month.”

Flop ETFs

iShares MSCI Turkey ETF (TUR - Free Report) – Down 8.0%

As the Fed hiked interest rates last week for the second time this year and gave a hawkish signal on the future rate hike trajectory, U.S. dollar gained strength. This has probably spoilt the sport for emerging market ETFs like Turkey (read: Top and Flop EM ETFs as Taper Tantrum Completes 5 Years). 

Global X China Energy ETF  – Down 7.3%

Oil prices have drifted amid political spat among OPEC allies and escalating trade war tensions between the United States and China. Talks of a looming lift-up in OPEC output quota proposed by Saudi and Russia weighed on oil prices. The decision is likely to be objected by some other OPEC members. Plus, China said that it would levy tariffs on a variety of U.S. goods, including crude and gasoline, as a retaliation to President Donald Trump’s $50 billion levy on Chinese imports. All these probably dragged down China energy ETF.

Global X FTSE Southeast Asia ETF(ASEA - Free Report) – Down 5.9%

Escalating trade war tensions between the United States and China, and uncertainty ahead of the meeting between President Trump and North Korean chief Kim Jong-un put a brake on the Asian economies. The fund has considerable exposure to Singapore (30.9%), Thailand (24.9%) and Malaysia (21.7%) (read: ETFs to Watch Ahead of U.S.-North Korea Summit).

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