No shortage of tells on the Chinese consumer and economy for investors to digest this week. We’ve had everything from retail sales and industrial output to earnings from large-cap tech giants like Alibaba, Baidu, JD.com and Tencent. So, how fares the China reopening story? And what ripple effects are we seeing in the commodity space? Joining us on Monday at 1 pm ET on ETF Edge to weigh in are three of the best in the business – Brendan Ahern, CIO of KraneShares, Will Rhind, Founder and CEO of GraniteShares and Todd Rosenbluth, Head of Research at VettaFi.
Keeping up with the AI craze. As AI trends take the world by storm, Roundhill Investments is getting in the game – expanding its thematic lineup by launching a new Generative AI ETF (CHAT). The actively managed ETF targets global companies taking on major AI initiatives, honing in on generative AI á la ChatGPT, in particular. Roundhill will aim to be “extremely selective” in order to avoid “watered down exposure” to companies that may claim they’re heavily involved in generative AI but barely scratch the surface. Top holdings include Nvidia, Microsoft, Alphabet, Baidu and China-based iFlytek.
Skirting the bitcoin ETF backlash. After facing many roadblocks in its push to get approval for a bitcoin ETF, Grayscale is now looking overseas in an effort to partially circumvent regulatory restrictions imposed by the SEC. The company has filed to launch a U.S.-listed ETF that would partly invest in spot bitcoin exchange-traded products already up and running in other countries.
Race to launch an ether futures ETF. In other crypto news, five ETF issuers filed to launch ether futures ETF weeks last week – aiming to capitalize on the world’s second-largest cryptocurrency, behind bitcoin. Grayscale was the first to act, filing 10 days ago to launch the Grayscale Ethereum Futures ETF – but was quickly followed by Direxion, Roundhill Investments and Bitwise just a day later. Valkyrie also filed on May 12.
Embracing the ETF wrapper in the EM space. Global X has just finished converting two of its actively managed mutual funds – the Global X Emerging Markets Great Consumer ETF (EMC) and the Global X Emerging Markets ETF (EMM) into actively managed ETFs. Global X senior portfolio manager Malcolm Dorson says, “A number of long-term tailwinds look set to bolster the case for active emerging markets exposure, which require a very different investment approach than developed markets do.”
