Views from the Desk

Podcast: A Deep Dive on Sector Investing

Feb. 19, 2025

What are the sectoral flows into and out of the Global Industry Classification Standards, or GICS, telling us? In this episode, special guest Michael Arone, ETF Strategist Bipan Rai, and your host, Erika Toth, delve into the leaders and laggards. They also look back at historical trends and ahead for potential opportunities.

Erika Toth is a Director of Institutional and Advisory for Eastern Canada at BMO Global Asset Management (BMO GAM). She is joined on the podcast by Bipan Rai, Head of ETF Strategy , BMO GAM, and Michael Arone, Chief Investment Strategist, Managing Director, State Street Global Advisors. The episode was recorded live on Wednesday. February 192025.

ETFs mentioned:

Alpha: A measure of performance often considered the active return on an investment. It gauges the performance of an investment against a market index or benchmark which is considered to represent the market’s movement as a whole. The excess return of an investment relative to the return of a benchmark index is the investment’s alpha. 

Beta: A measure of the volatility, or systematic risk, of a security or a portfolio in comparison to the market as a whole.

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The viewpoints expressed by the speakers represent their assessment of the markets at the time of publication. Those views are subject to change without notice at any time. The information provided herein does not constitute a solicitation of an offer to buy, or an offer to sell securities nor should the information be relied upon as investment advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results. 

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You cannot invest directly in an index. 

Sector ETF products are also subject to sector risk and non-diversification risk, which generally will result in greater price fluctuations than the overall market.

The Select Sector SPDR Trust consists of eleven separate investment portfolios (each a Select Sector SPDR ETF” or an ETF” and collectively the Select Sector SPDR ETFs” or the ETFs”). Each Select Sector SPDR ETF is an index fund” that invests in a particular sector or group of industries represented by a specified Select Sector Index. The companies included in each Select Sector Index are selected on the basis of general industry classification from a universe of companies defined by the S&P 500®. The investment objective of each ETF is to provide investment results that, before expenses, correspond generally to the price and yield performance of publicly traded equity securities of companies in a particular sector or group of industries, as represented by a specified market sector index.

The S&P 500, SPDRs, and Select Sector SPDRs are trademarks of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. and have been licensed for use. The stocks included in each Select Sector Index were selected by the compilation agent. Their composition and weighting can be expected to differ to that in any similar indexes that are published by S&P.

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