Boost to Banks, Services Lifts ETFs

Positive news for the service sector and an upgrade at several banks sent stocks and ETFs higher Monday.

Traders turned their attention to banks after Goldman Sachs (GS) upgraded Wells Fargo (WFC) to "Buy" and added Capital One Financial (COF) to its conviction list. The firm argued the share prices of large banks don't reflect their earnings potential.

Separately, the Institute for Supply Management said its nonmanufacturing index, a measure of the U.S. service sector's health, surpassed expectations. The index rose to 50.9% last month, up from 48.4% in August. (Economists had predicted a neutral reading of 50.0%.)

Stocks jumped after the news, recovering some of last week’s losses. The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up 112 points, closing at 9600. The benchmark index had given up 1.8% last week amid negative employment and manufacturing reports. The broader indexes also gained ground. The Nasdaq picked up 20 points to end the day at 2068, and the S&P 500 climbed 15 points to 1041.

Crude oil futures finished higher on Monday, ending up 46 cents on the day at $70.41 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Helping oil’s rise was a weakened U.S. dollar. Although finance ministers from the Group of Seven nations meeting over the weekend made no mention of currencies, the U.S. dollar buckled against most of its major rivals on Monday.

Hopeful for continued investor focus on commodities, Jefferies Group (JEF) launched its first exchange-traded fund, the Thomson Reuters/Jefferies CRB Global Commodity Equity Index Fund (CRBQ), which will trade on the NYSE Acra Exchange. Although the expectation is that this fund will come under scrutiny as potential new futures regulations kick in at some point, co-President of Jefferies Asset Management, Adam De Chiara, downplayed the risk. “Unlike many futures-based commodity ETFs, potential new futures regulation should not impact the ability of these ETFs to issue shares,” De Chiara said in a statement.

In other ETF news, Tom Lauricella of The Wall Street Journal calls index-tracking bond ETFs a letdown, while The Journal’s Jeff Opdyke urges ETF investors to consider silver over its warmer-hued counterpart, gold. His view: It’s only a matter of time until silver gets its comeuppance. “It's a precious metal accumulated by investors and central banks as a quasi-currency. And it's an industrial metal with an increasing number of applications in health care, electronics and even food and clothing, where silver's antibacterial properties are taking hold.”

Although, silver has fallen out of favor recently, as the financial crisis sapped industrial demand for the metal, Opdyke notes that industrial demand is expected to rebound next year.

For a detailed rundown on Monday’s trading session see our markets story.

The iPath AIG Cocoa Total Return Sub-Index ETN Series A (NIB) gained 8.18%, while the Direxion Daily Financial Bull 3X Shares (FAS) rose 8.13%.

The Direxion Daily Financial Bear 3X Shares ETF (FAZ) lost 8.05%, while the Direxion Shares ETF Trust: Direxion Daily Energy Bear 3X Shares (ERY) fell 8.15%.

Earnings and Conference Calls
Collective Brands, Gartner, Paterson-UTI Energy, Pepsi Bottling Group, Tesco, ViroPharma

Economic Data
Nothing on the agenda for tomorrow.