April proved to be the third strongest month on record for the Tradeweb European ETF marketplace, with total traded volume amounting to EUR26 billion. Meanwhile, half of transactions in European-listed ETFs were processed via AiEX, Tradeweb’s Automated Intelligent Execution tool.
Adriano Pace, head of equities (Europe) at Tradeweb, says: “Adoption of automated trading continues to rise, thanks to new features such as our time release functionality, which helps clients pre-plan and set up trade execution timings to suit their specific needs. Ultimately, AiEX delivers workflow optimisation and improved efficiency for trading desks, helping them to reduce costs and operational risk.”
‘Buys’ nearly mirrored ‘sells’ in equity and commodity-based ETFs during the month. In contrast, ‘buys’ in fixed income ETFs outstripped ‘sells’ by 14 percentage points. Activity in the asset class increased to 39 per cent of the overall platform flow, beating the previous 12-month rolling average by six percentage points. More than EUR4.9 billion in notional was executed in European equity ETFs, April’s most heavily-traded category.
There were six fixed income products among April’s ten most actively-traded ETFs, with the iShares JP Morgan EM Local Government Bond UCITS ranked first. The fund, which tracks the JP Morgan GBI – EM Global Diversified 10 per cent Cap 1 per cent Floor index, last occupied the top spot in November 2018.
Total consolidated US ETF notional value traded in April 2019 was USD 9.27 billion.
As a percentage of total notional value, equities accounted for 72 per cent and fixed income for 25 per cent, with the remainder comprised of commodity and specialty ETFs.
Adam Gould, head of US equities at Tradeweb, says: “Despite the continued April trend of low volumes and lower volatility, activity on Tradeweb continued to grow, up 34 per cent year over year. With average block trade sizes close to USD 10 million, it’s clear that the value of Tradeweb’s RFQ functionality is increasing for clients who trade ETFs at varying size.”
During the month, 470 unique tickers traded on Tradeweb’s US ETF platform, with the first two funds coming from the same JP Morgan group of products.
