MORE BASKETS FOR YOUR EGGS

摘要

A country-and-western song is running through my head. The lyrics say that "walkin is easy when the road is flat" and that "God gave us mountains so we could learn how to climb." How flat do you want your walk to be on Wall Street? With exchange-traded funds, you can take a steep route and reach splendid heights, but at risk of a severe fall. For such daredevils there are ETFs that hold just one position (gold), or just stocks in a narrow sector like green technology. For a safer route you can opt for a widely diversified fund, like the iShares Dow Jones Total Market (the ticker is IYY). This fund holds thousands of stocks that are in the Dow Jones U.S. Total Market Index.