Alternative investments

Global X Funds on Thursday launched the Global X Fertilizers/Potash ETF, giving investors access to what Global X calls a “critical” agricultural and commodity sector.

Direxion has launched four new leveraged exchange-traded funds, tied to the DAXglobal Russia Index and the DAXglobal Agribusiness Index. Each of the funds seeks 300% of the daily performance or the daily inverse of those indexes.

Russell Investments and Axioma have launched a series of long-only large- and small-cap factor indexes designed to help investors better manage their portfolio’s exposure to five risk factors.

Palmer Square Capital Management, a manager of hedge funds-of-funds and customized alternative investments, had launched its first open end mutual fund, the Palmer Square Absolute Return Fund.

Russell Investments has launched a new suite of six exchange-traded funds, the Russell Investment Discipline ETFs, which focus on six investment styles commonly used by investment managers.

Janus has launched the Janus Real Return Allocation Fund, which seeks to provide total returns in excess of the rate of inflation over a full market cycle. Janus will co-manage the fund with Armored Wolf.

Global X Funds has launched the Global X Fishing Industry ETF, which it says is the first exchange-traded fund to target the fishing industry. It will invest in commercial fishing companies that capture fish from the wild and aquaculture fish farming companies.

The Investment Company Institute held its annual meeting of its membership in Washington, D.C. last week. Close enough to Securities and Exchange Commission headquarters that chairman Mary L. Schapiro could swing by and let the assemblage know that existing mutual fund distribution rules "can't be left to stand."

Tradar said its portfolio management software will become available as a hosted service for fund managers, through Eze Castle Integration.

Morningstar has added 10 alternative investment categories to its classification system, eight of which cover exchange-traded funds and two the broad universe of funds.

Aberdeen Asset Management has launched the Aberdeen Emerging Markets Debt Local Currency Fund in response to growing interest in the asset class, as investors look to diversify their fixed income exposure.

Genworth Financial Wealth Management has introduced a streamlined approach to diversifying investments through its Genworth Portfolio Solutions (GPS).

Hatteras Funds has added two single strategy hedged mutual funds to its lineup of alternative mutual fund products. They are the Hatteras Long/Short Equity Fund and the Hatteras Long/Short Debt Fund.

Intech has launched the Alpha Capture Index strategy as a passive alternative to capitalization-weighted indexing. Intech says the strategy has the potential to outperform a market-cap-weighted index and is more stable than an equal-weighted portfolio.

ProShares has launched two new exchange-traded funds, the ProShares Ultra High Yield and the ProShares Ultra Investment Grade Corporate funds. The firm says it is they are the first ETFs to offer exposure to the two fixed income asset classes.

Global X Funds has launched the Global X Waste Management ETF, which will evenly divide its holdings in hazardous and non-hazardous waste and recycling companies.

State Street Global Advisors has launched a new exchange-traded fund based on a corporate bond index weighted according to three quantitative measures: return on assets, interest coverage and current ratio.

ProShares has launched two inverse Treasury exchange-traded funds, the ProShares UltraShort 3-7 Year Treasury ETF and the ProShares Short 7-10 Year Treasury ETF.

Goldman Sachs Asset Management has launched the Goldman Sachs High Yield Floating Rate Fund. It invests in below investment-grade, floating-rate loans and other variable-rate securities issued by U.S. and foreign companies. The fund’s investment objective is to generate a high level of current income.

Columbia Management has launched two absolute-return funds, the Columbia Absolute Return Multi-Strategy Fund and the Columbia Absolute Return Enhanced Multi-Strategy Fund. Both funds use multiple strategies to reduce portfolio volatility.