To this point, much of the tremendous growth in the ETF industry–we now have close to 1,200 U.S.-listed exchange-traded products with aggregate assets approaching $1.1 trillion–has been attributable to “passive” products; those that seek to replicate the benchmark of an index. Several actively-managed ETFs have debuted in recent years, but investor response to these products has been generally muted (there are, of course, some noteworthy exceptions, including PIMCO’s MINT and a number of WisdomTree’s active currency and bond funds). [click to continue…]
One of the hottest topics in the industry at present is the future of actively-managed ETFs. The issue is also a very divisive one; some expect that widespread adoption of active ETFs is only a matter of time, while others believe mutual funds will continue to be the vehicle of choice for those interested in [...]
Claymore, the Chicagoland issuer known for its line of themed ETFs and targeted sector funds, has launched three new ETFs based on broad market indexes maintained by Wilshire. The new funds include the Wilshire 5000 Total Market ETF (WFVK), Wilshire 45oo Completion Index ETF (WXSP), and Wilshire U.S. REIT ETF (WREI).
San Francisco-based Grail Advisors is set to expand its presence in the actively-managed ETF space, introducing four actively-managed ETFs later this week: RP Growth, RP Focused Large Cap Growth, RP Technology, and RP Financials. The new funds will join Grail’s existing actively-managed ETF, the Grail American Beacon Large Cap Value ETF (GVT), which launched earlier [...]
In the summer of 1992, Eugene Fama and Kenneth French published “The Cross-Section of Expected Stock Returns” in The Journal of Finance, a groundbreaking analysis that prompted financial presses to run headlines declaring “beta is dead.” While the death sentence may have been a bit severe, it struck a significant blow to a widely-accepted and [...]
