Leveraged Exchange Traded Funds

Leveraged Exchange-Traded Funds (LETFs) are publicly-traded funds that promise to provide daily returns that are in a multiple (positive or negative) of the returns on an index. To meet that promise, the funds use leverage, which is typically obtained through derivatives such as futures contracts, forward contracts, and total-return swaps. As of the end of 2012, there were over 250 LETFs in North America with total assets of approximately $32.24 billion. While the amount of assets held by these funds is still small, their popularity continues to grow as their trading volume is significantly larger and much more dynamic than traditional, non-leveraged ETFs. This comprehensive guide to LETFs provides high-level practitioners and researchers with a detailed reference tool for navigating the market and making informed investment decisions. Written from a measured analytical perspective, Miu and Charupat use clear and concise explanations of all important aspects of LETFs, focusing on such key elements as structure, pricing, performance, regulations, taxation, and trading strategies. The first two chapters set the stage for the book by identifying exactly what LETFs are and how they are regulated. The following chapters then look to bridge theory with practice to dive deep into the mechanics, portfolio rebalancing techniques, and daily compounding effects that make investing in these funds so lucrative.

This book provides an analysis, under both discrete-time and continuous-time frameworks, on the price dynamics of leveraged exchange-traded funds (LETFs), with emphasis on the roles of leverage ratio, realized volatility, investment horizon, and tracking errors. This study provides new insights on the risks associated with LETFs. It also leads to the discussion of new risk management concepts, such as admissible leverage ratios and admissible risk horizon, as well as the mathematical and empirical analyses of several trading strategies, including static portfolios, pairs trading, and stop-loss strategies involving ETFs and LETFs. The final part of the book addresses the pricing of options written on LETFs. Since different LETFs are designed to track the same reference index, these funds and their associated options share very similar sources of randomness. The authors provide a no-arbitrage pricing approach that consistently value options on LETFs with different leverage ratios with stochastic volatility and jumps in the reference index. Their results are useful for market making of these options, and for identifying price discrepancies across the LETF options markets. As the market of leveraged exchange-traded products become a sizeable connected part of the financial market, it is crucial to better understand its feedback effect and broader market impact. This is important not only for individual and institutional investors, but also for regulators.

This is the eBook version of the printed book. This Element is an excerpt from The ETF Trend Following Playbook: Profiting from Trends in Bull or Bear Markets with Exchange Traded Funds (ISBN: 9780137029013) by Tom Lydon. Available in print and digital formats. The real truth about leveraged ETFs—and why commonly held beliefs about them just aren’t true. With popularity comes criticism and nit-picking. Leveraged ETFs are no exception. Some pundits believe these specialized ETFs have increased market volatility in the last hour of trading. But many investors and people in the media are having trouble getting their arms around the truth. The SEC has been looking closely at these funds and have had dialogue and visits with ETF providers who are offering them. Here are the facts....

This is the eBook version of the printed book. This Element is an excerpt from The ETF Trend Following Playbook: Profiting from Trends in Bull or Bear Markets with Exchange Traded Funds (ISBN: 9780137029013) by Tom Lydon. Available in print and digital formats. Why go “short”–and how to use leveraged ETFs to do it more effectively. During the last several bear markets, you might have been well served by reducing your exposure to equities. A number of investors–perhaps even you–decided to “short” the market instead of exiting entirely. By shorting stocks, investors can potentially make money when the stock loses value. Short selling can help you accomplish several goals.

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2013 in the subject Business economics - Investment and Finance, grade: 2,7, University of Mannheim (Area Banking, Finance, and Insurance), language: English, abstract: Leveraged exchange-traded funds (LETFs) track the development of an underlying index with a certain multiplier. For compounding and non-compounding effects this is only guaranteed on a daily basis which raises concerns about their performance in the long run. After analyzing the LETF market in Germany, I ran a Monte-Carlo simulation of three multipliers across five different holding periods (one week to 4 years) to estimate the tracking error and I found that the multipliers deviate substantially for holding periods longer than one month. Using the rebalancing method with a 5% trigger proposed by other researchers, I was able to reduce the tracking error to negligible levels. In a nutshell, a buy-and-hold strategy using LETFs does not guarantee the multiplier in the long run and I recommend to invest directly in the index to participate from long-term stock market growth.

A comprehensive catalog of exchange-traded funds and insights into successful trading techniques This Second Edition of the bestselling Trading ETFs offers an updated version of the definitive guide to this vital part of the capital markets. It contains numerous new examples of the techniques that author Deron Wagner uses in selecting the most timely ETFs to trade and underscores the core insights of his trading discipline "trade what you see, not what you think." Written for professionals who are using, or should be using, ETFs as an asset class within their portfolios, as well as the individual investor who wants exposure to wider sectors and geographical regions than those available elsewhere. This revised edition of the classic resource focuses on the pros, cons, and potential pitfalls of trading the latest class of ETFs Includes inversely correlated and leveraged ETFs and the dangers, risks, and benefits associated with each new class of ETF Contains a refresher on the initial concept of ETF selection and new case studies on ideal entry and exit points as well as examples of real trades This thoroughly revised and updated edition offers a "go-to" reference for understanding exchange-traded funds.

Suppose the market is going to ‘crash’. What would you do? The most common answer would probably be: Sell what you have and get out of it. However, what if you have nothing to sell? A couple of years ago, simple investors would have said: ‘Stay on the sidelines’. The sophisticated and professionals always had plenty of avenues, such as shorting the stock, buying put options or selling naked calls. The gap was narrowed with the arrival of leveraged and inverse ETFs. These allow even novice investors to short the market in a less risky way. Traditional ETFs track an index or basket in a one-for-one approach, basically they are managed passively. In contrast, leveraged and inverse ETFs are intraday traded, and shouldn’t be confused with more-vanilla ETFs. Leveraged ETFs require active management which involves the borrowing of funds to purchase additional shares (bullish LETFs) or the short-selling (bearish LETFs) and the rebalance of the position on a daily basis. At present, most levered ETFs are either 2X, 3X, -2X, or 3X, and therefore they give investors the possibility to earn two or three times (and loose two or three times) the daily return of a simple long or short position in the index. These levered ETFs have leverage (borrowing) built into their structure, thus eliminating the need for investors to do their own borrowing (margin, futures, swaps etc.) or short-selling. But, the leveraging process is built to achieve an objective quite different from that of the simple and classical ETF.