Supply chain bottlenecks and rising inflation have been the major factors dampening the basic material sector's growth. However, a boom in infrastructure operations, such as road construction and maintenance, bridge building and repair, port development, and housing construction should help the sector achieve significant growth this year.
While the industry has made substantial progress over the past couple of years, an improving global economy and clean-energy drives should further propel the industry's growth. Investors' interest in this space is evident in the ProShares Ultra Basic Materials ETF's (UYM) 32.7% gains over the past year versus the S&P 500 Trust ETF's (SPY) 14.8% returns.
