August ETP launch review

A new issuer enters the market in an otherwise slow summer month

This report aggregates newly launched funds in August and highlights the performance of the funds launched in July.

• 33 funds were launched in August (change from July)
• 18 funds were launched in the Americas, two in Europe and three were launched in the APAC region
• WBI Investments dominated the month of August by entering the ETF space with ten newly launched funds

August New Listings

Alternative ETFs outpaced equity ETFs in the month of August for the first time this year. This was a result of WBI Investments launching their first ten funds in the last few days of the month, all of which were alternative ETFs. Outside of WBI Investments, only 13 other funds were launched, marking the slowest month for ETF launches this year.

The remaining funds were equity ETFs as well as four new fixed income ETFs with exposure to US bonds. Bosera Asset Management added the lone commodity ETF tracking the gold spot listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

A large majority of the funds launched were actively managed. While ten out of the 14 came from WBI Investments, both ProShares and First Trust launched two actively managed funds of their own. This is the first time that there have been more actively managed funds launched than indexed funds.

July Flows

Almost $1bn in assets flowed into the 33 funds launched in July. The largest gainer was HSBC Worldwide Equity UCITS ETF (HWWD) which has had $452min inflows since inception.

Overall, equities gained 92% of the inflows which has been a consistent pattern for 2014. As a region, Europe brought in 72% of all asset inflows for the funds that were launched in July. This was in large due to the massive inflows into HWWD.

HWWD invests in large and mid-cap companies across developed and emerging markets to capture the performance of the global equities market.

Sprotts Gold Miners ETF(SGDM) led the Americas with $36m in inflows by providing exposure to large- and mid-cap gold companies. Gold miners have underperformed the price of gold since April of 2011. Sprotts is hoping that a strong demand for gold, particularly from China, Russia and India will give gold mining stocks a boost in the coming months.

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This article was published by S&P Global Market Intelligence and not by S&P Global Ratings, which is a separately managed division of S&P Global.