Countries In Review: April 2019

February was a fairly positive month for country ETFs, though the best and worst performers were found mainly in emerging markets. The Global X MSCI Greece ETF (GREK) was the best-performing fund, with a gain of 9.66%. It was followed by the VanEck Vectors Vietnam ETF (VNM), which was up 6.58%, and the iShares MSCI Hong Kong ETF (EWH), which was up 5.76%. At the other end of the spectrum was the iShares MSCI South Africa ETF (EZA), with a 5.64% decline; the iShares MSCI Qatar ETF (QAT), down 5.49%; and the iShares MSCI Brazil ETF (EWZ), down 4.62%. The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) saw the most inflows in the country space, pulling in $2.5 billion during the month. EWH came in a distant second, with a gain of $302.4 million, while the iShares MSCI France ETF (EWQ) saw inflows of $179.1 million. The iShares MSCI Japan ETF (EWJ) lost $461.7 million during the month, and the iShares MSCI Spain ETF (EWP) and iShares MSCI Taiwan ETF (EWT) had outflows of $201.3 million and $85.2 million, respectively.

Index Data Source: MSCI.
ETF Return Data Source: Bloomberg.
All return data from 01/31/2019 to 02/28/2019.

Note: This list intends to capture the returns of most liquid ETFs tracking individual countries around the world. It does not capture every country in the MSCI All Country World Index. Also, as indicated by the design above, frontier market countries are not included in the MSCI All Country World Index.