U.S. stocks began the week on a lower note as worries over
Japanese growth and more concerns regarding Greece hit stocks on
Monday morning. However, investors did carry stocks off of their
lows around noon, pushing equities back up to respectable levels to
close out Monday trading.
Thanks to this, the Dow finished the day down about 0.3%, while
the S&P 500 fell by -0.1% and the Nasdaq bucked the trend and
added 0.1% for the session. This broad trend generally followed
European and Asian indexes lower, as these benchmarks also finished
in the red for the most part (read
Three Overlooked High Yield ETFs
).
From a sector perspective, basic materials were a definite loser
while staples were also down as well. Financials and tech were more
mixed, as Google led the sector higher with a 2.8% gain in Monday
trading.
This trading came despite a flat dollar for the most part, as
the American currency lost just a tad against its global
counterparts. Still, rates edged higher in the U.S. and Germany
while worries cooled over PIIGS debt, at least for now, in large
parts of the bloc.
Yet even with a weaker dollar, commodities remained under
pressure led by severe weakness in the agricultural market. Energy
and precious metals also slumped on the day, leaving livestock
commodities as one of the few winners to open up the week (see
The End of the Social Media ETF Nightmare?
).
In ETF trading, volume was once again very light across the
board as major American index products saw volumes which were about
half the normal level. Still, a few products did see some interest
in the otherwise light session, specifically in the commodity
producer world and in the foreign ETF market as well.
In particular, ETF investors saw an outsized level of interest
in the
Market Vectors Agricultural ETF (
MOO
)
. The fund has seen a ton of extremely light trading days as of
late but today saw volume reach about 2.2x a normal day (read
How Do You Invest For The Coming Crop Crisis?
).
This increase in volume comes despite a relatively negative day
in which MOO lost about 0.6% in the session. However, the trend
since the start of June is very bullish for the fund, even with the
low volume, as the product has bounced off of its 52 week lows and
is now poised to break through short-term moving average levels as
well.
Another fund which saw a big day of volume was the
iShares MSCI Italy Index Fund (
EWI
)
. The fund usually does about 700,000 shares in a normal day but
saw just over three million shares move hands on the session (read
Is The Italy ETF Next?
).
While the product did lose about 0.4% on the day, some are
becoming more optimistic regarding the short-term outlook for both
the country and the region.
According to Bloomberg
, short interest has fallen significantly in Europe so it is
possible some are positioning themselves for a mini rally in Europe
over the coming days.
(see more in the
Zacks
ETF Center
)
ISHARS-ITALY (EWI): ETF Research Reports
MKT VEC-AGRIBUS (MOO): ETF Research Reports
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