ALPS Fund Services, best known as a service provider to the exchange-traded funds and mutual funds industries, is expanding its own internally developed lineup of ETFs.

The company has filed papers with the Securities & Exchange Commission for five new ETFs, all of which are focused on commodity-producing equities. The new funds will be:

• Agricultural Producers ETF
• Energy Producers ETF
• Industrial Metals Producers ETF
• Precious Metals Producers ETF
• Commodity Producers Composite ETF

All five ETFs will be passively managed, and will hold global portfolios of companies that derive at least half of their revenues from the production and distribution of the relevant commodities, subject to certain liquidity and market-cap requirements. The Commodity Producers Composite covers all global commodity producers, pulling from a universe of approximately 2,500 names.

Many of the new ETFs will go head-to-head with competing, established products, in many cases from commodity expert Van Eck. ALPS’ Agricultural Producers ETF, for instance, will face an established competitor in the Market Vectors Agribusiness ETF (NYSE Arca: MOO), while the Precious Metals Producers ETF will go head-to-head with the Market Vectors Gold Miners ETF (NYSE Arca: GDX).

The Industrial Metals Producers ETF is perhaps the most unique of the bunch; there is no existing ETF that covers the industrial metals business on a broad basis.

ALPS currently offers just one ETF: the Cohen & Steers Global Realty Majors ETF (NYSE Arca: GRI), which aims to take an “intelligent” approach to the REIT market.

The filing for the new funds can be found here.

--This article was submitted by IndexUniverse.com’s Matt Hougan.