Gold ETFs Lose Their Luster

Stocks finished nearly flat Friday, which also made them flat for the year to date. The Dow Jones Industrial Average has clawed back 36% from its March lows. Despite unemployment topping 9.4% and job losses for May hitting 345,000, investors stuck with stocks, which were buoyed by rising energy prices through the week until a mild trailing off on Friday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 12 points Friday to close at 8763. To see a complete rundown on Thursday’s trading session see our market story.

A pickup in small-cap stocks left the iShares Russell 2000 Index (IWM) up 3.3% as investors became more comfortable putting money in riskier companies. Signs of encouragement in the property sector produced mild positive results for the iShares Dow Jones U.S. Real Estate ETF (IYR).

A significant pullback from gold, which took a big drop to $954 an ounce on Friday, hit the Market Vectors Gold Miners fund (GDX). It lost 8.1% for the week. Fluctuation in natural gas prices came down negative over the week, dropping the United States Natural Gas fund (UNG) 5.3%.

Bidding for Barclays Global Investors' iShares exchange traded funds may not be at an end, despite the April agreement to sell the business to CVC Capital Partners, a European private equity firm. The U.K. press reported that Vanguard had offered a $5 billion bid for the world's biggest sponsor of exchange traded funds.

Launching Pad
Pimco, entered the exchange-traded fund business Tuesday with the launch of the Pimco 1-3 Year U.S. Treasury ETF (TUZ), a short-term Treasury fund. It plans to launch six other funds.

Old Mutual recently sought permission from the Securities and Exchange Commission to launch five exchange traded funds. The proposed funds include the Old Mutual FTSE All-World fund, Old Mutual FTSE Emerging Markets fund, Old Mutual FTSE All-Cap Asia Pacific ex Japan fund, Old Mutual FTSE All-World ex-U.S. fund and the Old Mutual FTSE Developed Markets ex-U.S. fund.

ProFunds Group launched four new leveraged funds: the Ultra MSCI EAFE (EFO), Ultra MSCI Emerging Markets (EET), Ultra FTSE/Xinhua China 25 (XPP) and the Ultra MSCI Japan (EJZ).

Earnings and Conference Calls

Monday
Alliance One International, Blyth, Ferrellgas Partners, Forest City Enterprises, Inc., IDT, Pall, Quiksilver

Tuesday
CRA International, Korn Ferry International, Movado, Pep Boys, Piedmont Natural Gas,
Shuffle Master, Sina, Talbots

Wednesday
Brown-Forman, Luby's, Men's Wearhouse, Neiman Marcus, Volt Information Sciences

Thursday
Del Monte Foods, Hoku Scientific, Lululemon Athletica, National Semiconductor,
New Frontier Media

Friday
No major earnings scheduled for release

Economic Data

Monday
No major economic indicators.

Tuesday
7:45 a.m. ICSC Chain Store Sales
8:55 a.m. Redbook Retail Sales
10:00 a.m. April Wholesale Trade
5:00 p.m. ABC/Washington Post Consumer Confidence

Wednesday
8:30 a.m. April Trade Balance
2:00 p.m. May Federal Budget Balance
2:00 p.m. Federal Reserve Beige Book

Thursday
8:30 a.m. Initial Jobless Claims
8:30 a.m. May Retail Sales
8:30 a.m. May Retail Sales, ex-autos
10:00 a.m. April Business Inventories
10:00 a.m. DJ-BTMU Business Barometer

Friday
8:30 a.m. May Import Prices
10:00 a.m. Mid-June Reuters/Univ. Michigan Sentiment Index

A look at how the industry's most popular ETFs did on Friday: