David Fuller's view Deutsche Bank's new exchange-traded commodity funds will appeal to investors looking for security because they are backed by physical gold, the German bank told Reuters on Monday. Thorsten Michalik, head of db x-trackers, which houses the exchange traded commodities (ETCs) said four were listed in Frankfurt on Monday and that the plan was to roll them out to Milan and London over the next few weeks. "All our ETCs (in Europe) are collaterised by gold. There are no questions about the quality of the collateral," he said. "It's the highest guarantee you can have for your money. It doesn't matter which ETC, they will all be backed by gold bars ...competitors use baskets of equities and bonds." The new listings included a short gold ETC, a short oil ETC, a long oil ETC and a long industrial metals ETC -- aluminium, copper and zinc. Short refers to expectations of lower prices. The ETCs will be based on Deutsche's own commodity indices and Standard & Poor's commodity index, not on the underlying futures, which some investors view as risky. "The product is targetted at institutions such as pension funds, corporates, insurance companies and also for the retail market, Michalik said. "(Many) cannot invest in futures directly ... The ETCs are very transparent; fees are the lowest in the market." The cost of storing gold will be 20 basis points of the value of the holding and the management fee for the ETCs is 45 basis points. "The ETCs can be used for diversification and Deutsche Bank will be the market maker for the ETCs, so it will be a liquid market, there will always be a price," Michalik said. Deutsche is planning to list 30 ETCs by June and a total of 50 ETCs by the end of the year, making it a direct competitor to UK-based ETF Securities. It estimates assets under management in ETCs at around $20 billion in Europe. "The ETC market is one of the fastest growing investment segments in the exchange traded product (ETP) market," it said. A recent Deutsche Bank research report showed total assets in exchange traded commodity products across Europe grew 145 percent in 2009 compared with 43 percent in equities and 17 percent in fixed income. (Reuters)