Vanguard Group today launched three exchanged-traded funds that are benchmarked to international indexes, confirmed John Woerth, company spokesman. The Vanguard European VIPERs will track the MSCI Europe index of stocks from 16 European countries. Vanguard Pacific VIPERs will track the MSCI Pacific index of stocks from Japan, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore. Vanguard Emerging Markets VIPERs will track the select emerging markets index, a custom MSCI index consisting of stocks that can be bought free of restrictions in 18 emerging markets in Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America.
Vanguard now offers 23 ETFs, which have assets of nearly $7 billion. All trade on the American Stock Exchange.
