Putting an International Spin on Dividend ETFs

Adding to the growing ETF landscape, New York-based WisdomTree Investments has launched 10 dividend-weighted ETFs in its crusade to compete for a share of the burgeoning ETF market against much larger rivals including Barclays Global Investors (BGI), PowerShares, State Street Global Advisors (SSgA) and the Vanguard Group.

The new funds track WisdomTree’s proprietary indexes with a focus on international sectors. Like other ETFs from the company, these products are constructed to track fundamentally weighted dividend indexes and not capitalization-weighted indexes. In other words, WisdomTree weights companies according to their dividend stream, not their market size. Dividends are ranked as a key measure of fundamental value.

“This launch highlights the consistency and transparency of our approach. Investors can now split our WisdomTree DIEFA (Dividend Index of Europe, Far East Asia and Australasia) into regions, capitalization segments and sectors,” says Bruce Lavine, WisdomTree president and chief operating officer. “This expands our unique product line and allows investors to access a host of investment strategies that were previously difficult to implement.”