If inflows into VGK stay strong, we could see an exciting race in the competition for the most inflows of 2013. The current leader is the WisdomTree Japan Hedged Equity ETF (DXJ), which attracted $8.7 billion in new money this year; VGK's year-to-date tally is $5.3 billion. DXJ has pulled in about $600 million since June, so its inflows may have topped out. We could see a tight race between an ETF that tracks Japan and one that tracks Europe, which would have been inconceivable 18 months ago.
4. A Solar-Powered Sprint
The Guggenheim Solar ETF (TAN) is having one of the most memorable runs of any ETF ever, with a year-to-date return of 141 percent. It’s one thing to outpace all the other nonleveraged ETFs, but TAN is now beating all the leveraged and inverse ETFs too—such as ProShares Ultra Nasdaq Biotechnology (BIB), up 128 percent, and Direxion Daily Healthcare Bull 3x (CURE), up 126 percent.
We covered TAN back in May when it was up 41 percent. Even that gain was a bit of a shock given the ETF's earlier near-death experience. Until the end of last year, TAN'S return since inception was -91 percent. Everyone thought its initial run was a prolonged dead-cat bounce, but TAN’s consistency has silenced the skeptics. We'll see if that continues.
5. Recovery From a Muni Mawling
Worries over rising interest rates have whacked the largest muni bond fund in the world. The iShares National AMT-Free Municipal Bond ETF (MUB) has been bleeding assets and trading at a discount to its net asset value since May. Since then, it has been on a bleak trip down the abyss.
MUB saw its first sign of life last week. That's when it had its first inflows since May, with a respectable $50 million. And it didn't close at a discount on Oct. 24 -- the first time in five months that the price wasn't below the net asset value. These signs could signal a turnaround in this ETF and in the municipal bond market in general.
A period of prolonged low rates, which seems more likely after the economic hit from the government's partial shutdown, would make MUB more attractive as an income play. It yields about 3 percent for a tax-equivalent yield of about 5 percent. This, and the beating MUB has taken, could give investors an opportunity to get back into the fund at a good price. Stay tuned.
Eric Balchunas is an exchange-traded-fund analyst at Bloomberg.