Last week was moderate for Wall Street. The S&P 500 (up 0.4%), the Dow Jones (0.24%) and the Nasdaq Composite (up 0.4%) — the big three indexes advanced moderately last week. This was probably because of a slight surge on the virus front. Though multiple states in the United States have lifted COVID-19 restrictions, almost half of United States reported rising cases recently, thanks largely to delta variant.
The ISM Services for June came in a little bearish, coming in 320 basis points lower on its survey headline than expected, to 60.1%. It was also off May’s record high of 64.0%. Price increases and worker shortages seem to account for the relative headwinds. Still, the reported data were way above the breakeven level of 50% (read: 3 Sector ETFs That Have More Room for Growth in Q3).
Meanwhile, jobs data came in robust on Jul 2. The U.S. economy added 850,000 jobs in June 2021 (after rising 559,000 in May), beating market expectations of a rise of 700,000 (read: 5 Sector ETFs to Play Robust June Jobs Data).
Against this backdrop, below we highlight a few leveraged ETFs that were most gainful last week.
Inverse Energy
Oil prices have staged a rally lately with United States Oil Fund LP (NYSE:USO) and United States Brent Oil Fund LP (BNO) enjoying higher demand. However, USO lost 1% last week. The breakdown of the OPEC+ output cut talks and rising cases of the Delta variant of coronavirus probably weighed on the energy market last week. As a result, inverse energy ETFs gained materially (read: Optimistic About Oil ETFs? 2 Factors May Hurt the Energy Market).
Microsectors -3X U.S. Big Oil Index ETN NRGD – Up 14.4%
S&P Oil & Gas Exploration Bear 3X Direxion (DRIP) – Up 10.2%
Inverse China
Didi Global shares dropped last week in U.S. trading as the ride-hailing company was slapped with a scrutiny over its data security and a broader Chinese crackdown on companies listing their shares abroad. This probably hurt the entire Chinese market.
FTSE China Bear 3X Direxion YANG – Up 11.9%
Leveraged Real Estate
The benchmark U.S. treasury yield dropped to 1.37% on Jul 9 from 1.48% touched on Jul 1 with a low of 1.30% hitting on Jul 8. As a result, the rate-sensitive U.S. real estate sector gained last week. The sector offers higher returns due to their outsized yields. Additionally, rising rents due to the shortage of homes are driving the sector higher.
Real Estate Bull 3X Direxion DRN – Up 8.2%
Leveraged Cybersecurity
Operations of around 1,500 organizations were compromised by the file-encrypting malware recently after an incident at U.S. IT firm Kaseya. The rampant usage of Internet has raised the risk of cyber threats. In case of work from home, proprietary business data is being accessed from personal computers and laptops that may not have the same level of security as in-office setups. Public-sector organizations are facing massive problems. No wonder, cyber security stocks gained recently.
Ultra Nasdaq Cybersecurity ETF UCYB – Up 7.1%
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United States Oil ETF (USO): ETF Research Reports
Direxion Daily MSCI Real Estate Bull 3x Shares (DRN): ETF Research Reports
Direxion Daily FTSE China Bear 3X Shares (YANG): ETF Research Reports
MicroSectors U.S. Big Oil Index 3X Inverse Leveraged ETN (NRGD): ETF Research Reports
ProShares Ultra Nasdaq Cybersecurity (UCYB): ETF Research Reports
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