SPDR ETF

Five of the best sites for SPDR ETFs, exchange traded funds that attempt to follow the S&P 500 or S&P sectors such as financial, energy, gold, oil, etc. Also known as “Spider” ETFs from the acronym SPDR, which stands for Standard & Poor’s (S&P) Depository Receipts. Know of another site that should be listed here? Leave your suggestion at the bottom of this page.

1. State Street Global Advisors SPDR ETFs - The inventor of ETFs with the original S&P 500 SPDR Trust Series I (ticker symbol: SPY), State Street now offers SPDRs covering every imaginable investing preference. Get information on Spider ETFs covering just large cap stocks, midcap stocks, small cap stocks, growth stocks, value stocks, dividend stocks, gold, energy, financial, utilities, technology, international stocks and more. (www.ssgafunds.com)

2. Select Sector SPDRs - From the site: “Select Sector SPDRs are unique ETF’s that divide the S&P 500 into 9 sectors. To strengthen your portfolio, simply choose the sectors that fit your investment needs. Select Sector SPDRs offer the all-day tradability of stocks, the diversity of mutual funds and the tracking of an index.” Types of Spider ETFs you can buy (through your broker on the AMEX, not here) include ETFs focusing on consumer discretionary spending, consumer staples, energy, financial, health care, industrial, materials, technology and utilities. (www.sectorspdr.com)

3. What is a Spider and Why Should I Buy One? - Good explanation of what a SPDR fund is, although it focuses strictly on the S&P 500 total index SPDR (SPY) while SPDR has also come to mean the family of ETFs built around S&P sectors or S&P stocks of different market cap sizes. (www.investopedia.com)

4. How to Buy Index ETFs - Buying a SPDR ETF or any other ETF is the same process as buying an individual stock through your personal broker or online discount broker, and ETFs can be bought and sold throughout the day just like individual stocks. This article tells you that, plus gives you a few other tips on diversifying your ETF portfolio. (www.ehow.com)

5. Sector SPDR PerfChart - See one stock chart with all the sector SPDRs performance plotted on it, to see which SPDR has performed the best over the timeframe you choose (maximum three years). (stockcharts.com)

other tags: spyder, spyders, american stock exchange