Investors buy more when world's biggest leveraged ETF drops

Tokyo

MONEY is being shredded at an unprecedented rate in a souped-up exchange-traded fund (ETF) tied to Japan's most famous stock index.

Since mid-August, investors have poured a record US$4.5 billion into the Next Funds Nikkei 225 Leveraged Index ETF, a security designed to rise or fall twice as fast as its namesake equity gauge. That's too bad, considering that twice the Nikkei 225 Stock Average's loss over that period comes out to about 20 per cent.