Making the most of turbulent times

  Few sectors have seen as much turbulence as financials during the last year. Since 1 September 2008, the Dow Jones STOXX 600 Banks index, for example, has returned -28%. Year-to-date, however, it is up 46%. Faced with a tougher credit environment and significantly higher single-stock risk among financials, ETFs have increasingly been adopted as trading tools for making sector bets. With further bad news expected from banks in particular, however, short ETFs looked particularly well positioned for future growth. According to global fund flow data from EPFR Global, who track Europe...