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NEWSLETTER | 5 Mar 2021

We just had time to post our celebration of all the winners in the 11th outing of the ETF Express European Awards last week. The winners’ list is here and we congratulate all of our winners, and we will, very shortly, publish our European winners’ Special Report with interviews with winners drawn from the ETF issuer and service provider categories.

Thematic ETFs, including Active ETFs, dominated 2020 and this week’s issue of our newsletter reflects exactly that. From Fundamental Income’s Net Lease REITs to video gaming with VanEck’s ESPO; from thematic specialists’ Global X, to South Korea’s AI ETF issuer Qraft, we have a wide range of themes covered this week.

ETFs are increasingly offering all types of investors access to investment trends that were not easily reached before. As Gina Miller, co-founder of SCM Direct, said at the virtual awards ceremony for our European winners: "When we started SCM in 2009 we talked about wanting to ‘democratise’ investing – to offer lower ticket investors model portfolios that balance cost, risk and returns whilst offering 100 per cent transparency. ETFs were the catalyst that enabled us to make that shift."

ESG has dominated thematic investing, particularly in Europe, and we also bring you an interview with Rumi Mahmood, formerly of robo-adviser Nutmeg, who in his new role at MSCI has published his first paper on ESG ETFs. And the US’s Northern Trust is to launch its FlexShares range in Europe, arriving, of course, with two climate focused ETFs.

Beverly Chandler
Managing Editor, ETF Express

Companies in this issue
Alger
FlexShares ETFs
Fundamental Income
Global X ETFs Europe
Invesco
MSCI
Net Lease REIT
Northern Trust
Qraft Technologies
SCM Direct
TrueMark
VanEck
WisdomTree
Women in ETFs

Over 200 exchanges to 'ring the bell for gender equality in 2021' with Women in ETFs and five partner organisations

Thu | 4 Mar 2021, 13:35

For the seventh consecutive year, a global collaboration of over 100 exchanges around the world will hold a bell ringing event to celebrate International Women’s Day 2021 (8 March 2020).

Thu | 4 Mar 2021, 13:35

2019 saw South Korean firm Qraft Technologies launch its first two ETFs, through US white labeller ETC, using an investment process based on a proprietary artificial intelligence (AI) security selection process that extracts patterns from analysing data.

Thu | 4 Mar 2021, 13:35

December 2020 brought news that the US’s thematic ETF specialists, Global X, with assets in early February standing at USD26.3 billion, was to launch a European office.

MSCI’s Mahmood publishes ESG ETF report

Thu | 4 Mar 2021, 13:35

Rumi Mahmood, Senior Associate, ESG Research, MSCI has published his first, in what is planned to be a series, of reports on ESG fund transparency.

Thu | 4 Mar 2021, 13:35

Northern Trust Asset Management’s FlexShares Exchange Traded Funds has announced it is to open in Europe, with the launch of two climate focused ETFs, the FlexShares Developed Markets Low Volatility Climate ESG UCITS ETF (QVFD) and the FlexShares Developed Market High Dividend Climate ESG UCITS ETF (QDFD).

Net Lease REIT ETF sees rapid recovery on back of strong fundamentals

Thu | 4 Mar 2021, 13:35

Fundamental Income’s net lease ETF, NETL, has endured a range of challenges over recent months, but its strong fundamentals are now driving its asset flows back up.

VanEck’s ESPO rises on thematic wave

Thu | 4 Mar 2021, 13:35

VanEck Vectors Video Gaming and eSports ETF (ESPO) has returned 84.24 per cent (NAV) for the year in another fine example of right place, right time investing.

Global ETF launches 25.02-04.03.21

Thu | 4 Mar 2021, 13:35

The big news in terms of launches this week is the debut of Northern Trust's FlexShares ETFs in Europe with the launch of two climate focused funds. Staying with the green theme, UBS GAM's latest offering is a low CO2 emissions ETF, while Invesco launched a Global Clean Energy fund as well as the first China All Shares ETF. Elsewhere, Invesco added an international equities fund to it's multi-factor suite, and Alger debuted its first active ETF, focused on 40 mid-cap growth stocks.

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