iShares Asia Region ETFs Recoup Losses, Climb Higher

iShares Asia region country-based ETFs regained their upward momentum last week, led by a strong rebound in the iPath ETN India and solid gains across the board.

iShares FTSE/Xinhua China 25 (FXI) rose 5% last week to increase its region-best year-to-date return to nearly 88%.

iPath ETN India (INP) went from being the biggest decliner two weeks ago, losing 8.6%, to recouping the losses and more in an 11.9% jump last week. INP is now up 57% ytd.

A handful of funds are trading above 40% again for their ytd return levels including Hong Kong (EWH), South Korea (EWY), Malaysia (EWM), Australia (EWA) and Pacific ex-Japan (EPP).

Singapore (EWS) is not far behind at just below 39% ytd.

Japan's (EWJ) was the laggard, gaining only 1.8% for the week and is still in the red for the year (-0.5%).

See the chart below for last week's results. There are two sets of returns for each ETF: the past week [light blue] and year-to-date [purple].

Note, the bars for the iShares S&P 500 index (IVV) are colored differently for comparative purposes.

Click to enlarge chart

Disclosure: The author does not own shares of any funds mentioned in this article.

In Monday (10/29) trading, the Hang Seng and India's BSE 30 climbed 3.9% and 3.8%, respectively, both setting new all-time highs, with the former surging past the 31,000 level and the latter eclipsing 20k intra-day. A number of other benchmarks hit new all-time closing highs, including the Seoul Composite, Malaysia's KLSE Composite, Taiwan's weighted index and Australia's All Ordinaries. Singapore's Straits Times closed just short of a new high. The Shanghai Composite gained 2.8% to 5,748, while the Nikkei rose 1.2% to 16,698.08.

Here is a list of the relevant ETFs and their tickers.

iShares Australia (EWA)
iShares FTSE/Xinhua China 25 (FXI)
iShares Hong Kong (EWH)
iPath ETN MSCI India (INP)
iShares Japan (EWJ)
iShares Malaysia (EWM)
iShares Singapore (EWS)
iShares S. Korea (EWY)
iShares Taiwan (EWT)
iShares EAFE (EFA)
iShares Pacific ex-Japan (EPP)
iShares S&P 500 (IVV)