A Look At The VIX ETP Landscape

 | Sep 10, 2012 01:58PM ET

Two thirds of 2012 passed before we saw the first new VIX-based exchange-traded product and it turned out to be an interesting one -- the First Trust CBOE S&P 500 Tail Hedge Fund ETF (ETRACS Volatility ETPs for the full list of ETPs set to close.)

Some Of The VIX Products
The graphic below is my periodic update of the VIX exchange-traded products (ETP) landscape, using the y-axis to denote leverage and the x-axis to indicate target maturity. In addition to the explanatory notes in the key at the bottom, it is worth noting that I use font color to distinguish between ETFs (black) and ETNs (blue). Also, I have used a parenthetical one letter code to identify the issuer: B = Barclays; C = Citibank; F = First Trust; P = ProShares; U = UBS; and V = VelocityShares.