Assets under management for the exchange-traded funds advised by First Trust Advisers (FTA) now exceed USD6 billion. FTA launched its first exchange-traded fund in September of 2005 and has since grown its product line to include a total of 44 ETFs covering a broad range of equity asset classes and high growth market segments.
“Reaching USD6 billion assets under management for ETFs is a very exciting milestone,” says Robert F Carey, CFA, and Chief Investment Officer of First Trust. "At First Trust, we remain focused on developing products that provide investors with targeted, efficient exposure to specialised segments of the market.”
In addition, FTA expects to launch the industry’s first Smartphone ETF on February 18, 2011. The First Trust NASDAQ CEA Smartphone Index Fund is expected to be listed on The NASDAQ Stock Market under the ticker symbol FONE. The fund provides a way to gain exposure to various companies involved in all aspects of the smartphone value chain including hardware manufacturers, operating system providers, chip makers, software manufacturers and service providers. The fund will seek investment results that correspond generally to the price and yield (before the fund’s fees and expenses) of an equity index called the NASDAQ OMX CEA Smartphone IndexSM.
“First Trust is extremely pleased to launch another pioneering exchange-traded fund,” says Carey. “We continually evaluate opportunities to broaden the First Trust family of ETFs, and FONE will enhance our unique specialty sector offerings.”
