Market Vectors said its plan to launch the Market Vectors MSCI World ex Australia Quality ETF is in response to demand from Australian investors for “greater choice” when investing internationally.
“Australian investment portfolios have one of the largest domestic equity biases in the world, dominated by banks and resource shares,” Van Eck Global and Market Vectors managing director Arian Neiron said.
“Australia lacks exposure to sectors such as technology and healthcare, which form much larger parts of the investment universe in other developed markets,” Mr Neiron said.
“Our new Market Vectors MSCI World ex Australia Quality ETF will provide Australian investors with a portfolio of some of the most exciting international companies such as Google and Apple via the ASX,” he said.
Mr Neiron also said its new ETF will provide Australian investors with access to a portfolio of 300 international shares that have demonstrated outperformance and lower volatility compared to “conventional global benchmark indices”.
“MSCI’s research suggests that quality growth companies that have high [return on equity], stable earnings and low financial leverage are uncorrelated with the broad business cycle and can provide diversification benefits in portfolio allocation,” Mr Neiron said.
Market Vectors said the new ETF will seek to track the MSCI World ex Australian Quality Index which selects international companies on the basis of high return on equity, stable year-on-year earnings growth and low financial leverage.
