ETFs

ASX losing direction, Zip on fire, Rural expands macadamia farm It was another mixed day for the ASX 200 (ASX: XJO) on Thursday, finishing slightly higher, up 0.2%, despite a strong opening. Thursday’s gains came from the IT and consumer staples sectors, which were both over 1% higher for the day, the former driven by a large…

Big super funds are looking at permanent changes to their communications strategies, advice model, administration and general member experience as a result of covid-19. Intra-fund advice is high on the agenda. QSuper, a pioneer among super funds providing full financial planning services to members, refined its advice model early last year to focus on intra-fund…

Global investors have poured a record amount into exchange-traded funds (ETFs) during the first two months of 2021, according to industry data. UK-based consultancy firm ETFGI clocked about US$222.5 billion (A$288 billion) of net flows into the sector globally over January and February, over twice the figure for the same period in 2020, the Financial…

ASX powers ahead, lower bond yields, records broken at Premier (ASX:PMV)  The ASX200 (ASX:XJO) delivered once again, pushing higher with falling bond yields and a finally weakening currency, which is now under 76 US cents. The much-anticipated release of the economic Purchasing Manager Index or PMI results, which offer an indicator of spending and investment intentions, hit…

Index providers should face the same regulatory hurdles as investment managers, a new US legal paper argues. In the US, plain-vanilla indexers are regarded as information ‘publishers’. The University of Virginia School of Law (UVS) report says most index providers are de facto ‘investment advisers’ – a term under US law that includes fund managers…

US-based niche thematic fund firm Ark Investment Management has jumped ahead of global giants BlackRock and State Street in exchange-traded fund (ETF) flows in January, according to a Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute (SWFI) report. The SWFI report says Ark, which runs seven ETFs based on ‘disruptive technology’ themes, took in US$1 billion on a single…

Former BlackRock executive Holly Framsted is to become head of ETFs for Capital Group in the US, which plans to launch a slate of both equity and fixed income actively managed listed funds in 2022. Capital, which has about US$2 trillion (A$2.6 trillion) under management, will be adding the ETFs to about 40 mutual funds…

Excess returns from active equities managers in emerging markets have declined steadily for more than 15 years and, while fees have come off too, mainstream managers should look at further reductions, according to Frontier Advisors. In its latest research note, ‘Active Management in Emerging Markets’, Frontier says the investors could consider emerging markets (EM) small…

Central bank largesse lubricated the relatively squeak-free ride of the global asset management industry through the COVID-19 crisis to date, but liquidity risks remain high, according to a new Amundi Asset Management report. In a ‘blue paper’ published last week, Amundi says only 117 out of the 35,000 funds sold in Europe froze redemptions since…

The launch early in February this year of Australia’s first unlisted fund to be quoted on the ASX, by Magellan group and its administrator, Mainstream, took a while to sink in, not helped by the dislocation caused by the pandemic crisis. But, as Australia at least, is preparing to get back to business at some…