Invesco PowerShares Capital Management, the US provider of exchange traded funds, has launched three ETFs which enable investors to take different levels of risk based on different asset allocation styles. The ETFs are based on three defined risk profiles targeting a given percentage of investment in equity and fixed income securities: balanced, balanced growth and growth. They are expected to begin trading 15 May 2008 on the NYSE Amex stock exchange, the firm said. ETFs, which are listed like stocks, enable investors to gain exposure to stock, bond, commodity and other markets without the investor having to own the underlying components of an index. The expected ETF portfolio names are PowerShares Autonomic Balanced NFA Global Asset Portfolio; PowerShares Autonomic Balanced Growth NFA Global Asset Portfolio and PowerShares Autonomic Growth NFA Global Asset Portfolio. Although still a debated topic in the investment industry, most academic and other studies suggest that asset allocation accounts for up to around 90 per cent of the variation in returns from an investor’s portfolio, with the remainder coming from stock picking, market timing and sheer luck. Invesco PowerShares is a part of Invesco, the US investment management company.