Putting A Price On Investment Strategies

Gold stocks have historically ranked among some of the most volatile asset classes. Over any given one-year period, it is a non-event for gold stocks to move plus or minus 38 percent. This DNA of volatility is about three times that of gold bullion, which carries an annual volatility around 13 percent. Despite this volatility, our research shows that investors can use gold stocks to enhance returns without adding risk to the portfolio.

Looking today at week-over-week shares outstanding changes among the universe of ETFs covered at ETF Channel, one standout is the Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF (AMEX: VTI) where we have detected an approximate $175.6 million dollar inflow -- that's a 0.9% increase week over week in outstanding units (from 296,720,491 to 299,441,507). Among the largest underlying components of VTI, in trading today Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM) is off about 1.3%, Apple Inc (NASD: AAPL) is down about 0.6%, and International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE: IBM) is lower by about 1.3%.

In trading on Tuesday, shares of the Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF (AMEX: VTI) crossed above their 200 day moving average of $66.03, changing hands as high as $66.12 per share. Vanguard Total Stock Market shares are currently trading up about 0.7% on the day. The chart below shows the one year performance of VTI ...

MyPlanIQ submits:Recently there have been no lack of bad economic news. In the last six weeks, investors went into a full blown risk off mode, driving most stock indices lower. It would be a good time to check how asset allocation fund managers positioned their allocations amid the market tumult. It turns out that, surprisingly, smart money managers have kept their allocation in risk asset very steady. The following is MyPlanIQ's SmartMoney Manager indicator, as of last Friday (6/17/2011):

Dan Pritch submits: Evidently, there’s a race to the bottom in trading commissions seeing as how there are new discount brokers popping up with various free/low-fee commissions and now, multiple large names are offering trading on ETFs they manage or have relationships with absolutely free.

MyPlanIQ submits:Diversification in retirement investing is one of the most important factors for sound portfolio management. Recently, the ETF industry has witnessed tremendous growth: New and more innovative products are introduced continuously, and emerging market small cap ETFs are leading the way.

Richard Shaw (QVM Group) submits: There have been various commentaries recently about emerging markets being fully valued, because they have valuation multiples approaching those of developed markets. That is certainly true.

Chris Ciovacco submits: Yesterday, a client forwarded us a copy of a chart from an article entitled Stocks Remain Poised For A Steep Decline. They asked for our interpretation of the ominous looking chart showing a negative divergence between the S&P 500 and the Summation Index.