The Bank of Japan (BoJ) has approved a massive multi-asset purchase programme, including the purchase of billions of dollars worth of exchange-traded funds (ETFs), designed to stimulate the Japanese economy. The BoJ will purchase Topix and Nikkei 225 ETFs so that the amount outstanding will increase at an annual pace of 1 trillion yen – approximately $10.5 billion per year.

Contrary to recent forecasts predicting the end of the gold bull market, Graham Tuckwell, Founder and Chairman of ETF Securities, believes untapped demand from China and India, and retail investors, will lead to a second decade of growth for the gold market. Ten years on since Tuckwell launched the world’s first physical gold exchange-traded product in Australia, similar products are now listed on 31 exchanges throughout the world and have seen assets under management reach $147 billion.

Global index provider FTSE Group and DPT Capital Management, a New Jersey-based investment firm, have announced the launch of the FTSE Target Exposure Commodity Index Series, a series of rules-based long-short commodity indices. The indices are derived from the innovative work of Professor John M. Mulvey, a Princeton University academic and co-founder of DPT Capital, on risk management and portfolio allocation, an approach known as Dynamic Portfolio Tactics.

Risks continued to ease in the fourth quarter of 2012, with no signs of a reversal ahead, according to risk specialists Axioma. Melissa Brown, Senior Director of Applied Research at Axioma, said: “The decline in risk should give investors the opportunity to focus on achieving active returns.” With predicted risk considerably reduced, now could be the time for risk tolerant sophisticated investors to consider tactically adding a degree of leverage to their portfolios via leveraged exchange-traded funds (ETFs) offering geared exposure to various markets.

In a recent research report, analysts at AXA Investment Managers came out bullish on Asian emerging market equities, putting it among their top calls. One way to implement this trade is via exchange-traded funds (ETFs) linked to the MSCI Emerging Markets Asia Index (MSCI EM Asia), an index which targets the precise region the AXA analysts are positive on.

Lyxor has announced the launch of the Lyxor ETF MSCI ACWI Gold (GLDM), a new exchange-traded fund offering access to a global portfolio of gold mining stocks. The fund, which is based on the MSCI ACWI Gold Index, enables investors to gain exposure to the gold theme via mining companies whose fortunes are strongly tied to the price of the precious metal. The fund has been listed on the NYSE Euronext Paris and comes with a management fee of 0.50%.

Emerging ASEAN markets such as the Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand continue to offer good opportunities for investors looking for fast-growing economies with robust fundamentals. Significant growth in the size and wealth of the middle-class, combined with an expected acceleration in infrastructure investment, helps build a compelling, multi-year case for the region’s equities. For investors looking to buy into emerging ASEAN, exchange-traded funds (ETFs) provide an effective means of achieving liquid, targeted exposure at low cost.

Commodity ETP assets rose to a year-end record high of $199.8 billion in 2012, an increase of $29 billion compared to the end of 2011. Commodity ETP assets have nearly doubled since the end of 2009 and have increased nearly seven-fold over the past five years as investor demand for hard assets (particularly gold and silver) and familiarity with commodity exchange-traded products have increased.

Japanese equities have rallied strongly over the past three months, with the widely followed Nikkei 225 adding an impressive 20.6%. However, Japan-linked equity ETFs haven’t necessarily matched this stellar performance. The NYSE-listed iShares MSCI Japan ETF (EWJ), for example, managed only 7.5%. By contrast, dollar-hedged ETFs, which hedge currency fluctuations between the dollar and yen, have kept in sync. The WisdomTree Japan Hedged Equity ETF (DXJ), for example, posted a return of 19.5%.

Stoxx, a leading index provider, has announced the launch of the iSTOXX Efficient Capital Managed Futures 20 Index, a new index based on research provided by Efficient Capital Management, a global leader in the Managed Futures industry. The index, which measures the performance of some of the world’s largest Commodity Trading Advisors (CTAs), has potential uses as a benchmark against a single CTA or pool of CTAs, or as an underlying for financial products such as synthetic exchange-traded funds.