Globally listed Exchange Traded Products (ETFs) and Exchange Traded Products (ETPs) reached a new record high of $2.7 trillion at the end of August, a report said.

Year-to-date (YTD), net new assets gathered of $185 billion surpass the previous high of $140.1 billion set in the first eight months of 2012, according to research by ETFGI, a wholly independent research and consultancy firm providing services to leading global institutional and professional investors.

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 $67.9 billion, Asia Pacific (ex-Japan) with $103.7 billion, Europe with $477.4 billion, the US with $1.91 trillion and globally with $2.7 trillion.

YTD net new assets (NNA) flows reached record levels for the ETF/ETP industries in Japan at $16.5 billion, Europe at $50.4 billion, the US at $107.3 billion and globally at $185 billion.

“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,” said Deborah Fuhr, managing partner at ETFGI.

“The S&P 500 was up 4 per cent in August and closed above the 2,000 threshold for the first time on August 26th. Developed markets were up slightly, emerging markets gained 3 per cent and Latin America was up 9 per cent in August. August was also a good month for fixed income.”

In August 2014 ETFs/ETPs saw net inflows of $24.7 billion. Equity ETFs/ETPs gathered the largest net inflows with $12.7 billion, followed by fixed income ETFs/ETPs with $9.8 billion, and commodity ETFs/ETPs with net inflows of $235 million.

iShares gathered the largest net ETF/ETP inflows in August with $14.5 billion, followed by Vanguard with $6.4 billion, DB x-trackers with US$1.1 billion, new entrant WBI Shares with $1.04 billion and Think ETFs with $973 million in net inflows in August.

iShares is the largest ETF/ETP provider in terms of assets with $1 trillion, reflecting 37.8 per cent market share; SPDR ETFs is second with $432.5 billion and 16 per cent market share, followed by Vanguard with $414.9 billion 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 4 per cent market share.

ETFs are typically open-ended, index-based funds, with active ETFs accounting for less than 1 per cent market share.

ETPs are products that have similarities to ETFs in the way they trade and settle but do not use an open-end fund structure. – TradeArabia News Service