Trading activity on the Tradeweb European ETF marketplace reached EUR36.3 billion in December. The proportion of transactions processed via Tradeweb’s Automated Intelligent Execution (AiEX) tool was 72 per cent.
Adriano Pace, head of equities (Europe) at Tradeweb, says: “December marked the end of another recording-breaking year for our European ETF platform, which saw total traded volume exceed EUR470 billion in 2020, up 30 per cent from 2019 and 87 per cent from 2018. The number of transactions also increased by over 41 per cent, a testament to the efficiency and execution certainty our platform affords our clients, even at times of intense market conditions.”
All ETF asset classes saw net buying in December. Equities-based products accounted for 65 per cent of the overall platform flow, beating the previous 12-month rolling average by six percentage points. Trading activity in commodity ETFs dropped to 4 per cent, as a proportion of the total traded volume, for the first time since December 2019.
Once again, North America Equities topped the list of most heavily-traded ETF categories, followed by Europe Equities and Global Equities.
Two ESG-focused products, the iShares MSCI World ESG Enhanced UCITS ETF and the Amundi Index S&P 500 – UCITS ETF, were included in December’s top ten list by traded notional volume. Ranked first, the iShares $ High Yield Corporate Bond UCITS ETF tracks the performance of the Markit iBoxx USD Liquid High Yield Capped Index as closely as possible.
Total consolidated US ETF notional value traded in December 2020 reached USD 14.7 billion.
As a percentage of total notional value, equities accounted for 65 per cent and fixed income for 27 per cent, with the remainder comprising commodity and specialty ETFs. The proportion of US ETF trades executed on the platform via the Tradeweb AiEX tool increased to 48 per cent.
Adam Gould, head of US equities at Tradeweb, says: “December’s strong performance contributed to a record-breaking year for US ETF trading on our platform. Total traded volume surpassed USD 188 billion in 2020, up by over 50 per cent from the prior year, with 44 per cent of the notional executed in fixed income ETFs. Looking back, our platform’s ease of use fit well with the work-from-home environment our customers were thrown into.”
During the month, 777 unique tickers traded on the Tradeweb US ETF platform. Equity-based products dominated December’s list of most actively-traded ETFs, with the J.P. Morgan BetaBuilders Europe ETF returning to the top spot for the first time since June 2020.
