Sector Week-in-Review: Housing and Transport Lead Market Down

Nick Perry (Schaeffer's Investment Research) submits: Last week, we saw a fairly balanced picture. Silver was the stand-out leader while mild gains in housing and retail were offset by minor losses in some of the technology sub-groups.

This week we find that selling pressure dominated:

Gains were limited to just a few groups and those advances were slight. Cisco Systems (CSCO) surged 14 percent on Wednesday after reporting better-than-expected earnings to help the networking fund grind out a gain on the week. Consumer staples and energy funds held above breakeven. The bottom half of the list shows some moderately-large losses with homebuilders hardest hit.

For a longer-term perspective, the bullets below show how the ETFs listed above have faired during the past six months, prior to this week. In other words, it shows how they had been performing before this week's move.

Prior Six-Month Returns for This Week's Top Performing Sector Exchange Traded Funds:

* iShares GS Networking (IGN) -23.6%
* PS Energy Exploration & Production (PXE) +8.0%
* iShares DJ U.S. Energy (IYE) +8.3%
* SPDR-Consumer Staples (XLP) +7.2%
* SPDR-Energy (XLE) +7.2%
* PS Networking (PXQ) -15.7%
* iShares Lehman 1-3 Year Bond (SHY) -0.3%
* iShares Lehman Aggregate Bond Fund (AGG) -1.5%
* iShares DJ U.S. Technology (IYW) -9.8%
* iShares DJ U.S. Consumer Goods (IYK) +4.0%
* PS Telecom & Wireless (PTE) +5.8%
* Software HOLDRS (SWH) -9.4%

Prior Six-Month Returns for This Week's Bottom Performing Sector Exchange Traded Funds:

* PS Biotechnology & Genome (PBE) -12.0%
* PS Semiconductors (PSI) -18.0%
* First Trust DJ Select MicroCap (FDM) -3.9%
* iShares Nasdaq Biotech (IBB) -10.3%
* iShares Silver Trust (SLV) n/a
* Wilshire REIT Fund (RWR) +12.5%
* iShares C&S Realty Majors (ICF) +13.1%
* iShares DJ U.S. Real Estate (IYR) +11.5%
* PS WilderHill Clean Energy (PBW) -11.0%
* PS Building & Construction (PKB) -13.4%
* iShares DJ Transportation Average (IYT) +3.8%
* SPDR Homebuilders (XHB) -26.1%