DUST is NUGT's mirror, targeting -200% of the daily move of gold mining equities. Like its counterpart it is a 2x fund, reduced from 3x in 2020 — the naming convention misleads here and it is worth checking before sizing a position.
Direxion Daily Gold Miners Index Bear 2X ETF (DUST) is currently trading at $30.22. Over the past 52 weeks, DUST has traded between a low of $29.56 and a high of $179.30. Recent daily volume is around 2.4M. These figures update live as the market moves.
Short swap exposure to the gold miners index, reset daily. Mining equities are volatile enough that the decay from daily rebalancing is pronounced: a period where gold chops sideways can erode a DUST position substantially even though the miners finished where they started.
Traders positioning for rising real yields or a stronger dollar, and miners' shareholders hedging a position they intend to keep. It is also used tactically after a parabolic run in the gold complex, which tends to mean-revert hard.
Hawkish Fed communication, hot inflation data that pushes real yields up, and dollar strength. Also company-specific disappointments — the index is concentrated enough that a large miner's production miss can move the whole complex.