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January 01, 2007 at 02:00 AM
Over the past year, Japanese stocks have lagged most countries in the Pan-Asia basin. But that hasn’t stopped State Street Global Advisors (SSgA) from launching a fresh round of two new Japanese ETFs to add to the company’s growing roster of international funds.
As its name implies, the first of the two new funds, the streetTRACKS Russell/Nomura Prime Japan ETF (Amex: JPP) shadows an index created by the Russell Investment Group and Nomura Securities. This benchmark measures the performance of Japan’s 1,000 largest stocks; the ETF’s goal is to provide exposure to the broad Japanese stock market. According to the prospectus, the fund carries an expense ratio of 0.50 percent.
The other fund, the streetTRACKS Russell/Nomura Small Cap Japan ETF (Amex: JSC), also tracks an index created by Russell and Nomura, this one containing the smallest 15 percent of companies traded in the Japanese stock market. It has a slightly higher expense ratio of 0.55 percent to reflect the added hurdles that trading in smaller stocks can entail.
