After lingering in the background of the ETF industry for the last several years, fixed income funds have stepped up in recent months to become one of the primary drivers of growth. Through the first seven months of 2010, cash inflows to ETFs totaled $49 billion. Of this amount, more than $23 billion has been attributable to fixed income ETFs, reflecting that investors have become increasingly comfortable with the idea of achieving their fixed income exposure within the ETF wrapper. [click to continue…]
By most accounts, Charles Schwab’s venture into the ETF industry has been an extremely successful one. After launching its first fund in late 2009, the firm has subsequently rolled out seven additional equity ETFs offering exposure to all corners of the domestic and international equity markets. At the end of July, Schwab ETFs had $1.4 [...]
By most measures, Charles Schwab’s venture into the ETF space is off to a pretty good start; at the end of March, Schwab’s eight ETFs had aggregate assets of more than $950 million. All of the San Francisco-based firm’s existing ETFs track equity indexes, but that could change in coming months. Schwab recently filed details [...]
Fixed income ETFs have been one of the hottest growth areas in a rapidly-expanding industry. According to the ETF screener, there are now more than 100 bond ETFs available to U.S. investors, a significant increase from just one year ago. At the end of February, bond ETF assets totaled about $107 billion, an increase of [...]
After enjoying a record year in 2010, many in the ETF industry were disappointed when January figures revealed a material decline in total assets, breaking an impressive string of month-over-month expansion. The latest ETF statistics from the National Stock Exchange are out, and February results were more typical of the industry’s recent growth. Total ETF [...]
ETFs finished February range-bound, as most equity markets remained choppy to finish the week. This came after continued weakness in the euro zone and some disappointing news on the jobs front, with 20,000 additions to the list of people seeking unemployment benefits. In other news, AIG reported a $8.87 billion quarterly loss, raising concerns that [...]
Barack Obama’s first year in office has, by most accounts, been a mixed bag. The massive $787 billion stimulus plan helped to avoid an even deeper recession, but failed to impact joblessness in any meaningful way. Instead of seeing a downturn in the unemployment rate as promised, Americans have seen the rate grow to double [...]
As the ETF industry has continued its rapid expansion, there has been much debate surrounding the sustainability of the current growth and the potential saturation of the market. The first ETFs were relatively simple products, offering exposure to the world’s most widely-followed equity benchmarks. But the last ten years have seen hundreds of new ETFs [...]
Despite still rising unemployment, abysmal consumer confidence, and signs of ongoing crises around the world, there is little doubt, at least technically speaking, that the recession is finally over in most of the world. The downturn proved to be far more severe and prolonged than many had imagined, leaving its mark on even the most [...]
Earlier this year, San Francisco-based Grail Advisors broke onto the actively-managed ETF scene with the launch of its highly anticipated Grail American Beacon Large Cap Value ETF (GVT). After the follow-up launch of four additional ETFs last week, Grail is moving ahead with plans for two actively-managed fixed income ETFs. The proposed funds, both of [...]
Having been given the option, the vast majority of investors in storied hedge fund Cerberus Capital Management have opted to liquidate their holdings, rather than roll over their investments to a new Cerberus fund. The development is a blow to fund manager Stephen Feinberg, and on a higher level, to the hedge fund industry as [...]
