ProShares Short Financials ETF (SEF)

The ProShares Short Financials ETF (SEF) started trading in mid June 2008. It tracks the inverse of the Dow Jones U.S. Financials Index, minus expenses and fees. The ETF is supposed to go up when the index goes down, and down when the index goes up. The ETF's approach to tracking the inverse of the index involves short selling swap agreements and futures contracts.

The Dow Jones U.S. Financials Index, as its name suggests, tracks the performance of financial services companies in the US. As of August 2008, the index had 281 component stocks. Their industry breakdown, as of July 2008 was the following:


Banks 33.95%
General financial 28.41%
Insurance 16.41%
Life insurance 7.19%
REITs 13.27%
Real estate services 0.77%


The index's holdings, as of August 2008 are as follows:



The ProShares Short Financials ETF has an expense ratio of 0.95%.

Note that since this is a new ETF, it may not perform as expected. Its average daily trading volume is just over $2.8 million.