On The Road Again

PowerShares is scheduled to launch what are being billed as its first foreign ETFs (what about PID?) today as follows;

Global Water (PIO)
Global Clean Energy (PBD)
Developed International Opportunities (PFA)
Asia Pacific (PUA)
Europe (PEH)

I had a chance to look under the hood, the PowerShares website should have this information once trading commences, and it seems like PFA, PUA and PEH have a lot of holdings.

The back test on all of them is of course very good and my first impression is that they have a chance to add value for people who use broad-based products.

I will be curious to see how the Global Water (PIO) stacks against the Claymore fund with the similar name that trades under CGW. PIO does have more of an industrial tilt to it as opposed to CGW being more utilities centric so we'll see how that pans out in performance.

As is almost always the case I don't see much need to buy in on the first day. I tend to think it is best to let new products trade for a while to prove that they capture the intended effect.

On a separate note Joellyn and I are headed to NYC later today. I am speaking at a conference on Friday and doing a couple of other things too. On the way back we are going to a family function in Des Moines on Saturday and going to game six of the College World Series in Omaha on Sunday if we don't get rained out. The CWS is on my list so I am pretty excited.

As always I'll be posting as I go and if things work out the way I hope I should have some great pictures.