ETF Spotlight on the Market Vectors Agribusiness ETF (MOO - News) , part of an ongoing series.
Assets : $5.2 billion.
Objective : The Market Vectors Agribusiness ETF tries to reflect the performance of the DAXglobal Agribusiness Index, which follows companies involved in the agriculture business.
Holdings : Top holdings include Monsanto (MON - News) 8.7%, Potash Corp. (POT - News) 7.3%, Deere & Co. (DE - News) 7.2%, Syngenta AG (SYT - News) 7.1% and Archer Daniels (ADM - News) 5.5%.
What You Should Know :
- Van Eck ’s Market Vectors sponsors the fund.
- MOO has an expense ratio of 0.53%.
- The fund has 49 components and the top ten make up 57% of the overall portfolio.
- Sub-sector allocations include: basic materials 41.7%, Industrials 15.8% and consumer defensive 42.5%.
- Country allocations include: U.S. 38%, Canada 13.6%, Singapore 10.5%, Switzerland 7.1%, Malaysia 5.7%, Brazil 4.7%, Norway 4.1%, Netherlands 4.0%, Japan 3.7%, Australia 2.6%, Indonesia 1.7%, China 1.7%, U.K. 1.5%, Ireland 0.7%, Ukraine 0.5% and Argentina 0.1%.
- The ETF is down 2% over the past month, down 10.2% over the last three months and unchanged year-to-date.
- “While these varying degrees of operational leverage can render outperformance over certain periods, they do not provide a stable representation for the performance of agricultural commodities,” according to Morningstar analyst Abraham Bailin.
- “MOO’s holdings are made up primarily of grain-related agribusiness firms, counting the farmer as a chief customer. Farmer behavior is largely determined by notoriously volatile grain prices, so the fortunes of these companies can swing wildly,” Bailin added.
The Latest News :
- Agribusiness will benefit from population growth, rising living standards and increased use of biofuels, writes Sheridan Admans, investment research manager at The Share Centre, for FE Trustnet.
- Population growth should promote technological advances to meet demand and ensure quality of produce, replenishment of raw materials, distribution and efficient use of commodities.
- Urbanization in emerging economies will lead to a growing middle class and greater demand for meat and dairy products.
Market Vectors Agribusiness ETF
XLP_ETF
For past stories in this series, visit our ETF Spotlight category.
Max Chen contributed to this article.
