ETF Financial News

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Are you better off than when Jerome Powell assumed the chair of the Federal Reserve Board on Feb. 5, 2018? From the narrow viewpoint of investors, the answer would be yes.Over those eight-plus years, the central bank and the markets experienced a once-in-a-century pandemic, a near-total shutdown of major economies, and nearly an acute seizure of financial markets, followed by the biggest surge in inflation in over four decades.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The domestic precious metals market is adjusting to a major policy reset. The government has raised import duty on gold and silver by about 9%, including cess.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.MUMBAI: The government’s decision to curb silver bar imports could push exchange-traded funds (ETFs) tracking the white metal from trading at a discount to moving into a premium over spot prices, after two weeks, amid concerns of an impending supply squeeze, analysts said.This would mark a shift from ETFs trading at a discount to net asset value (NAV), which is calculated from spot prices, to potentially trading at a premium. It implies that if spot prices rise, ETF prices could rise more, and if spot prices fall, they would fall less than the spot.Premiums and discounts typically reflect demand conditions.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.It sounds like the investment opportunity of a lifetime: a chance to get in on one of the hottest names on Wall Street, before the company’s stock even starts trading.Financial advisers say buyer beware.It is technically possible for ordinary investors to get ahead of the coming oversize and high-profile public offerings expected in 2026—including SpaceX, OpenAI and Anthropic. Investors can get access through direct secondary marketplaces, exchange-traded funds that advertise private-company exposure and even crypto tokens that seek to mirror the performance of the company’s shares.But all those methods vary greatly in risk level and degree of actual ownership on offer, highlighted by Anthropic’s market-rattling warning this past week that it won’t recognize investments not approved by its board.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Bubbles are only dangerous if improperly managed.Stocks, indexes, and call-option implied volatility are advancing to ever-higher highs, despite innumerable risks that are almost too trite to mention. And yes, some are even calling it a bubble.Once more, we are at the tumultuous intersection of greed and hope.We recently suggested hedging in anticipation of a stock decline, but some investors will prefer to harness the wild-eyed enthusiasm of investor sentiment.We know of some very smart Wall Street pros who recently took profits and regret selling as stocks move higher.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Over the last few days, market intermediaries have launched regulated versions of digital gold that also allow individuals to take physical deliveries. On paper, these products promise the best of both worlds: access to high-purity gold at transparent prices without the hassle of storage.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.MUMBAI: Bears in gold and silver are in for a rude shock after the government raised import duty on bullion to 15% from 6%, a move expected to send prices on the Multi Commodity Exchange (MCX) soaring by more than 9% and potentially lock contracts at upper circuits.Gold and silver contracts on MCX have a maximum daily price limit of 9% in either direction. If international prices move beyond those levels, the exchange can relax the circuit limits in additional 3% bands.The government on Wednesday raised import duties on gold and silver as part of efforts to curb precious metals imports amid a swelling import bill triggered by the West Asia crisis.The duty hike comes days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged citizens to defer gold purchases for a year to help cushion the economic impact of the West Asia war.India imports about 700 tonnes of gold annually, putting pressure on the current account deficit (CAD) at a time when the conflict has driven crude oil prices up 45% to above $107 a barrel.CAD reflects the gap between the country’s foreign exchange earnings and spending.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The space race is heating up ahead of SpaceX’s initial public offering. And no, we’re not talking about competition for Elon Musk’s company from Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin, the United Launch Alliance joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin, or Rocket Labs.Fund companies are gearing up to promote their space-themed exchange-traded funds.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.How should you invest now that Kevin Warsh is almost certain to be the next Federal Reserve chair? The short answer: Stay the course.Warsh is headed for Senate confirmation and is likely to take over from Jerome Powell in mid-May. His first meeting leading the Federal Open Market Committee will be in June.

US-Israel and Iran escalated into a full-blown war in West Asia — and gold, instead of rallying, stumbled.Nippon India ETF Gold BeES, India’s largest gold exchange-traded fund (ETF), fell from ₹131.60 on 27 February 2026 — the day before the conflict began — to ₹110.72 by 23 March, shedding nearly 16% in under a month. The ETF has since recovered, gaining 11.5% from that low.

This persistent stalemate stems from caps on overseas investments imposed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi). Once these $8 billion aggregate ceilings were breached in 2022 and 2024, fresh allocations were halted. This effectively locked the market in favour of first-movers.

On 19 March, SBI Funds Management Ltd, the company that runs SBI Mutual Fund, filed papers with the capital markets regulator to offer its shares to the public for the first time. If it follows through with that plan, as expected in the second half of 2026, all the top four mutual funds in India by assets under management (AUM) will be listed on the stock market. SBI Mutual Fund is the largest of the lot, a position it has achieved over the past decade.

15 years.Rajan Mehta and Sanjiv Shah, former co-founders of the mutual fund which started India's first ETF, Benchmark Asset Management Co., have received final approval from the market regulator to launch Lakshya AMC.“Our underlying philosophy will remain passive, and we are not going for the active route,” Mehta told Mint. "Doing stock picking based on research.

Every financial crisis has a moment, usually identified only in retrospect, when an obscure product intended to mitigate risk spreads through what author Rick Bookstaber called “tightly coupled” interconnections to cause widespread damage. The first sign is lots of hard-to-understand stories that seem unrelated, except that they all involve a single sector.Think of all the stories in 2006 and early 2007 about subprime mortgages, underwriting fraud and various other technical-sounding events that seemed far removed from the real US economy and retail investors—until they weren’t.

Gold has nearly doubled and silver has tripled over the past two years. Both metals surged in popularity last year as investors globally placed greater trust in liquid physical assets over the US dollar-denominated financial system.In January, Indians invested more in gold exchange traded funds (ETFs) than in equity mutual funds for the first time, with net inflows surging to a record ₹24,040 crore even as equity fund investments slipped to ₹24,029 crore.

₹5.24 trillion as of January, according to data from the Association of Mutual Funds of India (Amfi). Over the past year, there were 37 new fund offers in these categories, compared with 19 across the broader equity segment.While Sebi permits only one scheme per category in most equity segments, there is currently no limit on the number of sectoral and thematic funds that an AMC can launch. This had led to a surge in offerings built around similar stocks packaged under different narratives.With the 50% cap in place, maintaining multiple differentiated active strategies within a constrained universe may prove difficult.

ETFs (exchange traded funds).While fund houses are preparing to launch offerings under the new category, the key question is whether these products meaningfully improve outcomes for investors.At its core, the structure is simple: risk reduces automatically over time.In the early years, for instance, 15 to 30 years before maturity in a 30-year fund, portfolios can hold high equity exposure, typically between roughly 65% and 95%, with smaller allocations to debt and limited exposure to gold and silver. As maturity approaches, equity allocation is gradually reduced while debt exposure rises to cushion volatility and preserve gains.

₹1.31 trillion worth of net inflows over the past one year. While passive investing should be approached in the same disciplined way as any other form of investing, long-term wealth creation should be built around broad market indices rather than thematic passive funds, says Hemen Bhatia, executive director and chief executive officer of Angel One Asset Management Company.In an interview with Mint, the former member of the team at Benchmark AMC that pioneered passive investing in India shares insights into the nuances of investing in passive funds.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. The dollar is in decline, and investors have to learn to live with it. The past 12 months were tough for the greenback.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) on Friday proposed sweeping changes to exchange traded funds (ETFs), aimed at eliminating a critical "pricing lag" that currently leaves investors exposed during volatile markets. In a consultation paper that’s open for comments until 6 March, the regulator suggested shifting the base price calculation for ETFs from a two-day-old value to the previous day’s data.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. As passive funds slowly yet surely get more traction in India, their asset mangers are expanding teams, typically very small, to run operations more efficiently and reduce gaps between their performance versus a market index. The bigger teams, small even after expansion compared to active funds, are helping passive fund managements create separate verticals, launch more products, and mirror better the indices they want to track.