Assets of exchange-traded funds and exchange-traded products listed globally reached a new record high of USD2.7 trillion at the end of August 2014, according to figures released by ETFGI.
Year to date, net new assets gathered of US185.0bn surpass the previous high of US140.1bn set in the first eight months of 2012.
The global ETF/ETP industry had 5,421 ETFs/ETPs, with 10,467 listings, from 223 providers listed on 60 exchanges, according to preliminary data from ETFGI’s end August 2014 Global ETF and ETP industry insights report.
New record highs in assets were reached at the end of August by ETF/ETP industries in Canada with US67.9bn, Asia Pacific (ex-Japan) with US103.7bn, Europe with US477.4bn, the US with US1.91trn and globally with US2.70trn. YTD NNA flows reached record levels for the ETF/ETP industries in Japan at US16.5bn, Europe at US50.4bn, the US at US107.3bn and globally at US185.0bn.
“In August investors invested net new money into an array of equity, fixed income and commodity exposures due to concerns over the situations in Ukraine and Gaza. The S&P 500 was up four per cent in August and closed above the 2,000 threshold for the first time on August 26. Developed markets were up slightly, emerging markets gained three per cent and Latin America was up nine per cent in August. August was also a good month for fixed income,” says Deborah Fuhr, managing partner at ETFGI.
In August 2014 ETFs/ETPs saw net inflows of US24.7bn. Equity ETFs/ETPs gathered the largest net inflows with US12.7bn, followed by fixed income ETFs/ETPs with US9.8bnn, and commodity ETFs/ETPs with net inflows of US235m.
iShares gathered the largest net ETF/ETP inflows in August with US14.5bn, followed by Vanguard with US6.4bn, DB x-trackers with US1.1bn, new entrant WBI Shares with US1.04bn and Think ETFs with US973m in net inflows in August.
iShares is the largest ETF/ETP provider in terms of assets with US1.0 trillion, reflecting 37.8 per cent market share, SPDR ETFs is second with US432.5bn and 16.0 per cent market share, followed by Vanguard with US414.9bn and 15.3 per cent market share. The top three ETF/ETP providers, out of 223, account for 69.1 per cent of global ETF/ETP assets, while the remaining 220 providers each have less than four per cent market share.
