5 ETFs That Gained Maximum Investor Attention Last Week

ETFs across various categories pulled in $22.1 billion in capital last week, pushing the year-to-date inflows to $406.3 billion. U.S. equity ETFs led the way with $12.1 billion in inflows, followed by inflows of $7.1 billion in U.S. fixed-income ETFs and $2.3 billion in leveraged ETFs.

SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust SPY, Vanguard S&P 500 ETF VOO, Direxion Daily Semiconductor Bull 3x Shares SOXL, iShares Russell 2000 ETF IWM and iShares Broad USD High Yield Corporate Bond ETF USHY dominated the top creation list last week.

Wall Street witnessed a mixed performance last week, with the S&P 500 shedding 0.8%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 2.1%, while Dow Jones Index gained for the fourth straight week, rising 0.8%. The small cap-focused Russell 2000 Index climbed 3.5%.

The divergence came amid the ongoing market rotation, where investors are shunning technology stocks in favor of smaller companies and other sectors, which are the bigger beneficiaries of Fed rate cuts. Tesla (TSLA) and Alphabet (GOOGL) reported disappointing second-quarter results last week that sparked a huge sell-off in the technology sector and the Nasdaq Composite Index (read: Tesla, Google Spark Sell-Off in Technology ETFs).

On the other hand, the bets that the Fed will cut interest rates in September are driving small-cap stocks higher. The pint-sized companies have a higher level of debt and lower rates generally lead to reduced borrowing costs. This helps small businesses expand their operations more easily and increases profitability, in turn stimulating economic growth. As small-cap companies are more domestically tied, these are poised to outperform when the economy improves.

We have detailed the ETFs below:

SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY)

SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust topped the asset flow creation last week, gathering $5.3 billion in capital. It tracks the S&P 500 Index and holds 503 stocks in its basket, with each accounting for no more than 7% of the assets. SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust is heavy on the information technology sector with a 31.2% share, while financials, healthcare and consumer discretionary round off the next three spots with a double-digit allocation each.

SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust charges investors 9 bps in annual fees and trades in an average daily volume of 39 million shares. It has an AUM of $552.2 billion and a Zacks ETF Rank #2 (Buy) with a Medium risk outlook.

Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO)

Vanguard S&P 500 ETF has accumulated $2.1 billion in its asset base. It tracks the S&P 500 Index and holds 504 stocks in its basket, each accounting for no more than 7.3% of the assets. Vanguard S&P 500 ETF is heavy on the information technology sector, while financials and healthcare round off the next two spots with a double-digit allocation each.

Vanguard S&P 500 ETF charges investors 3 bps in annual fees and trades in an average daily volume of 3.8 million shares. It has AUM of $476.6 billion and a Zacks ETF Rank #1 (Strong Buy) with a Medium risk outlook.

Direxion Daily Semiconductor Bull 3x Shares (SOXL)

Direxion Daily Semiconductor Bull 3x Shares has gathered $1.6 billion in its asset base, propelling its AUM to $10 billion. It targets the semiconductor corner of the technology sector with three times leveraged exposure to the NYSE Semiconductor Index. Direxion Daily Semiconductor Bull 3x Shares charges 72 bps in fees per year and trades in an average daily volume of 51 million shares (read: Beyond AI, Semiconductor ETFs Have Another Reason to Rally).

iShares Russell 2000 ETF (IWM)

iShares Russell 2000 ETF has accumulated $1.5 billion in its asset base. It is the largest and most popular ETF in the small-cap space, with an AUM of $72.2 billion and an average daily volume of 28 million shares. iShares Russell 2000 ETF holds well-diversified 1,986 stocks in its basket and has key holdings in financials, healthcare, industrials and information technology.

iShares Russell 2000 ETF charges 19 bps in annual fees and has a Zacks ETF Rank #2 with a Medium risk outlook (read: 5 Small-Cap ETFs Scaling New Highs).

iShares Broad USD High Yield Corporate Bond ETF (USHY)

iShares Broad USD High Yield Corporate Bond ETF has accumulated $1.2 billion in capital. It targets the U.S. dollar-denominated, high-yield corporate bonds and follows the ICE BofA US High Yield Master II Constrained Index HUC0. iShares Broad USD High Yield Corporate Bond ETF holds 1,871 bonds in its basket with an average maturity of 4.32 years and an effective duration of 3.19 years.

iShares Broad USD High Yield Corporate Bond ETF trades in an average daily volume of 7 million shares and charges 8 bps in annual fees. It has AUM of $16 billion.

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