The first quarter was a stock pickers’ market, given the great divide between the leaders and the laggards. Coffee heated up 62% as copper was hammered 11%. Russia crashed 17% while Egypt rallied 24%.

How should investors position their portfolios in the second quarter? We asked several professional investing strategists for their outlook on the stock market and single best ETF recommendation.

1. Martin Kremenstein, head of U.S. ETFs at Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management with $63 billion in assets under management in New York City: I think we’ve seen a strong indication that the Federal Reserve under Janet Yellen will continue to taper its quantitative easing policy, which will naturally lead to a strong U.S. dollar vs. both developed and emerging market currencies.

With several investment strategists expecting more stock market volatility in the U.S. in the second quarter, some are seeing opportunities in Brazil. View Enlarged Image

In this market environment, investors should consider hedging their non-U.S. equity investments against a strengthening U.S. dollar. Db X-trackers MSCI EAFE Hedged Equity (ARCA:DBEF ) is designed to provide exposure to securities in developed international stock markets while at the same time mitigating exposure to fluctuations between the value of the U.S. dollar and non-U.S. currencies from 22 component countries.

As developed markets outside of the U.S. continue to look increasingly interesting from both a valuation and recovery standpoint, the currency-hedge strategy offered by the ETF is a great investment idea for 2014. The structure of DBEF allows an investor to remain invested abroad, while still being protected against the impending rise of the U.S. dollar.

2. Prateek Mehrotra, chief investment officer at Endowment Wealth Management with $50 million in AUM in Appleton, Wis. Our outlook for the U.S. and global stock markets is positive for the current calendar year, albeit with a little more volatility than last year. Valuations in the U.S. are reasonable and not stretched by any parameter. Global markets are cheaper vs. the U.S. on a pure valuation basis. Equities are still cheaper relative to fixed income.

As long as corporate America continues to churn out good earnings growth, stocks will have a tail wind, given that we still have a loose monetary-policy environment, low inflation and the global economy is continuing to grow, barring any unforeseen geopolitical event that could turn the tables.

One area that we like as contrarians is emerging markets in general and the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) in particular. We generally do not recommend sector- or country-specific ETFs. However, we have strong contrarian conviction in Market Vectors India Small Caps (ARCA:SCIF ) and Guggenheim BRIC (ARCA:EEB ).