November 2
How Is ETN Different From ETF?
ETF is Exchange Traded Funds and ETN is Exchange Traded Notes, even though they sound similar ETFs differ from ETN. If you want to know more about ETFs there is a lot of information and blogs previously posted on this website. Over here I will be talking about Exchange Traded Notes and how they are different from Exchange Traded Funds.
Exchange Traded Notes are in a way a combination of bonds and Exchange Traded Funds. They were first issued by Barclays Bank PLC. Generally, notes are type of secured bonds with fixed returns and with principle protection but Exchange Traded Notes are unsecured debts, the returns of these notes depend on how good or how bad the markets perform and there is no protection of investor’s principle how one would have in case of bonds. ETNs can also be stock like bought and sold on the exchange during the trading hours, this feature of ETN matches with that of ETF.
One feature that helps the traders to differentiate between ETN and ETF is that there is a maturity associated with ETNs, so one can trade the ETNs on the exchange or wait for the maturity and get the principle and the gains or losses on that particular day. One aspect that may affect the price of these notes is the credit rating of the issuer of the notes. Therefore, even though there is not much change in the price of index, the value of exchange traded notes may fall due to the drop in the credit rating of the issuer. As per the IRS’ tax guide lines normal tax rates will be applicable on gains from currency ETNs as opposed to ETFs where capital gain taxes are applied. So when ETNs are compared to ETFs from taxation perspective ETNs loses its edge.
There are different types of Exchange Traded Notes available in the market today. However, the four major types of ETNs are Currency ETNs, Commodity ETNs, strategy ETNs and Emerging Market ETNs. Most of you might be aware about three of the above four types but Strategy ETNs. So what are strategy ETNs? Strategy Exchange Traded Notes are associated with the performance of the index. So Index Long and Index Short are examples of strategy ETNs. Two of the popular ETNs offered by Barclays are iPath CBOE S&P 500 Buy Write Index ETN (BWV) and Barclays GEMS IndexTM ETN (JEM).
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