Solid growth in this ETF's steel stocks

SHIRLEY WON
June 25, 2008 at 7:15 PM EDT



WHAT ARE WE LOOKING FOR?

Hot steel stocks.

Soaring steel prices amid tight supply have sent the Van Eck Market Vectors Steel exchange-traded fund on a tear over the past year.

Steel stocks have benefited from takeover activity and from emerging markets such as China and India, which are developing their infrastructures.

MORE ABOUT THE ETF

The ETF, which trades under the symbol SLX on the American Stock Exchange, includes common stocks and American depositary receipts of companies involved in the steel sector.

The fund includes steel makers, and also mining giants like Anglo-Australian Rio Tinto PLC, which is an iron ore supplier to the steel industry.

This week, Rio Tinto and China's largest steel maker, Baosteel, agreed on the highest price increase for iron-ore contracts in at least a decade.

Rio secured a price rise of up to 96.5 per cent from Baosteel compared with the 65- to 71-per-cent increase negotiated between Asian mills and Brazilian miner Vale in February.

The fund, which was launched in October, 2006, tracks the Amex Steel Index. The ETF has climbed 57.4 per cent over the past 52 weeks. It closed at yesterday at $102.79 (U.S.) on the American Stock Exchange.

MORE ABOUT TODAY'S SCREEN

For investors who want to examine one particular hot steel stock, we used Thomson to screen for stocks with the strongest earnings growth for the next fiscal year. Some stocks have suffered a pullback, and could be an entry point for longer-term investors.




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