I was one of the strategists that IBD’s ETF reporter, Trang Ho, interviewed for this story.  It should come as no surprise to regular readers that my choice for ETF to avoid was the Alerian MLP ETF (AMLP).

I have written unfavorably about AMLP many times in the past, trying to warn investors about AMLP’s Dirty Little Secret.  In the IBD article, I point out that of the more than 1,100 ETFs and ETNs on the market today, AMLP is the only one organized as a C-corporation, making it the only one reducing shareholder gains by about 35% to pay corporate taxes.

Four other funds were labeled in the article as investments to avoid.  Matt Hougan recommends against owning iPath S&P 500 VIX Short-Term Futures ETN (VXX) and VIX Mid-Term Futures ETN (VXZ), Michael Johnston says to avoid RBS U.S. Large Cap Trendpilot ETN (TRND), and Sam Subramanian doesn’t think investors should purchase United States Natural Gas Fund (UNG).

Disclosure covering writer, editor, and publisher:  No positions in any of the securities mentioned.  No positions in any of the companies or ETF sponsors mentioned.  No income, revenue, or other compensation (either directly or indirectly) received from, or on behalf of, any of the companies or ETF sponsors mentioned.

The article by Stan Luxenberg, On The ETF Death Watch, includes data and examples from my August ETF Deathwatch report as well as analysis on other concerns of ETFs with extremely low trading volume.

Mike Hogan’s article, Energy Plays Worth the Price of Admission (subscription required), includes additional insights from Elliott Gue, editor of MLP Profits Letter, and Morningstar ETF Strategist Paul Justice.  I talk about the attractive yields on MLPs and the success of MLP exchange-traded notes (ETNs).

DailyFinance and Sheryl Nance-Nash tackled some of these burning questions and more in a recent article, “Do Free ETFs Have a Hidden Price Tag?”  In bringing her piece to press, Sheryl relied on the expertise of one of our featured contributors, Brian Campos, who is the Director of Capital Cities Asset Management, our investment advisory affiliate.

Excerpts below impress upon the investing public that they should sit up and take note of what dominoes are falling around them.  I’m positive we’ll be hearing more about this subject in the coming months.

“As the two heavyweights battle it out in their never-ending quest for more assets to join their platform, Joe Q. Public gets an initial trading reduction. However, the underlying benefit is access, explains Brian Campos, director of wealth management at Capital Cities Asset Management. “ETFs enjoy several major benefits over mutual funds, and now investors won’t be hindered by trading costs to join the ETF universe,” he adds.

He goes on to address some of the possible disadvantages that investors must be aware of:

“This can be a drawback for investors who desire more specialized investments such as country/region specific portfolios, sector portfolios or special asset portfolios,” points out Campos. Fidelity has yet to include iShares’ other funds in their new offering. “Schwab’s’ offering is even more incomplete as they offer no fixed income portfolios and few differences in capitalization and style portfolios,” he adds

For this and more insights about the ETF price wars, here’s the entire article.

Karen Gibbs moderated the discussion, and I was joined on the panel by Roger Nusbaum, Jim Farrish, and Carlton Delfeld. Many of the events at the show were recorded on video and can be found at the MoneyShow website, including my “Five ETF Favorites in this Market.” (Note: I could not create a direct link to the videos. You will need to go to MoneyShow.com, click on the “video” header, then select “Most Recent Videos”. Additional menus allow you to select the event and speaker.)

For those who prefer their information in writing, here are the five ETFs I discussed. I chose to highlight one ETF from each of five major categories:

• Broad Market ETF Favorite: Vanguard Total World Stock ETF (VT) (comparing VT to ACWI)
• Bond ETF Favorite: iShares Barclays TIPS Fund (TIP) (TIP website)
• Commodity ETF Favorite: Greenhaven Continuous Commodity (GCC) (GCC website)
• International ETF Favorite: Market Vectors Brazil Small Cap ETF (BRF) (launch of BRF and Brazil ETF overview)
• Sector ETF Favorite: SPDR S&P Biotech ETF (XBI) (overview of Biotech ETFs and comparing IBB and XBI)

I would like to extend a special thanks to the good folks at Seeking Alpha for nominating me for inclusion on the San Francisco MoneyShow ETF Panel.  I will be speaking again on ETFs at the World MoneyShow in Orlando, February 3-6, 2010.

Disclosure (as required by FTC 16 CFR Part 255): I am long VT, ACWI, TIP, and BRF. I have no positions in any of the companies or ETF sponsors mentioned. I have never received any income, revenue, or fees from, or on behalf of, any of the companies or ETF sponsors mentioned.

Usually it is just a few paragraphs or excerpts that they choose to reprint, but in the June 15, 2009 edition of Barron’s, they chose to publish the entire main article from the June 10 issue of Invest With An Edge.

If you have a subscription to Barron’s, then here is a link to the online version.  If you do not have a subscription to Barron’s, you can read the original article here (including our Edge Chart graphics).

To subscribe to our free weekly newsletter – and get this type of market commentary many days before Barron’s subscribers do – you can sign up here.

Last month I was interviewed by Laura Cohn of Kiplinger magazine.  She was aware that we had recommended Netflix (NFLX) to our subscribers and wanted to see if I still liked the stock.  I told her I did, and introduced her to our Frugalpalooza theme.  She liked the idea so much that it made its way into the subtitle of her article “6 Stocks Benefiting From the Recession.”  Another one of our picks, O’Reilly Automotive (ORLY), also made the story.

Disclosure: no positions