Global ETF News Older than One Year
BATS Global Markets and Direct Edge Receive SEC Approval to Merge
All Regulatory Approvals Now Complete;
Transaction Close Expected Within Days
January 31, 2014--BATS Global Markets, Inc. (BATS) and Direct Edge Holdings LLC (Direct Edge) today announced the receipt of Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approval for their merger and expect to close the transaction within days.
The merger of BATS and Direct Edge, which was announced in August 2013, combines two customer-focused securities exchange operators under the BATS Global Markets brand to drive further innovation and better serve the trading and investing community.
Source: BATS
Vanguard's CEO dances to a fanatical discount tune
January 31, 2014--Bill McNabb has his dancing shoes on after bopping with his wife at The Commitments, the recently opened London musical.
"We love London," enthuses the Vanguard chief executive.
But show tunes are not the real reason for his good humour-an influx of client assets are.
Source: FT.com
SPDR Weekly Market Report
January 31, 2014--ECONOMIES: The Fed tapers again. GDP rises solidly in the US, Canada and the UK. Inflation remains uncomfortably low in the
eurozone. Industrial production jumps in Japan. Inflation remains benign in Australia. GDP rises in Spain.
MARKETS: Risk appetites continue to erode on emerging market concerns. Equities are mostly lower again. G7 government bonds remain bid. USD is broadly bid. Oil and gold are down.
NEXT WEEK PREVIEWED SPOTLIGHT:
The Reserve Bank of Australia, the Bank of England, and the European Central Bank should leave administered rates
unchanged. Employment should rise solidly in the US. Unemployment likely edges lower in Canada.
THE WEEK IN REVIEW
US
THE FED met widely held expectations by tapering again.
Specifically, the monetary policy setting Federal Open
Market Committee (FOMC) unanimously voted to reduce
the pace of asset purchases another $10 billion to $65 billion
per month ($35 billion longer-dated Treasuries and $30
billion mortgage-backed securities) beginning in February.
Moreover, the FOMC signaled that it expected to taper
in "further measured steps "at future meetings, which
keeps it on schedule to end new asset purchases in the
fourth quarter. Even as it tapers, the FOMC is continuing
its reinvestment program and has flashed no signals that
reinvestment will end any time soon.
For more information, including product fact sheets and related whitepapers:
Source: SSgA
BlackRock ETP Landscape-ETP Flows Quarterly-Duration Rotation
January 31, 2014--Highlights include:
Fixed income ETPs held $354 billion in assets globally at year end. They account for about 15% of total assets-three times their share in 2005 but down from a high of 17.4% at the end of 2012.
The big trend in 2013? A "great rotation" into funds focusing on shorter maturity bonds. Investors have been yanking money out of broad maturity funds and ploughing it into short duration and floating rate funds as they seek protection from higher interest rates.
The ratings distribution of the average corporate bond ETP is changing. Investment grade funds have declined in quality whereas high yield ETPs have risen (slightly). The reasons include ratings downgrades of (investment grade) financial issuers and increased flows into short-maturity high yield ETPs. These funds tend to have a higher credit quality.
Source: BlackRock ETP Landscape Research
World Bank January 2014 Commodity Markets Outlook Report
January 31, 2014--Overview
With the exception of energy, all the key commodity price indices declined significantly in 2013. Fertilizer prices led the decline, down 17.4 percent from 2012, followed by precious metals (down almost 17 percent), agriculture (-7.2 percent), and metals (-5.5 percent).
Crude oil prices (World Bank average), which have been remarkably stable during the past three years. averaged $104/barrel (bbl) during 2013, marginally lower than the $105/bbl average of 2012. Most non-energy commodity prices. notably grains, followed a downward path during 2013.
view the World Bank January 2014 Commodity Markets Outlook Report
View The Infographic: Commodity Markets-January 2014
Source: World Bank
WisdomTree to Expand Into Europe
To Enter Europe Through Majority Stake in U.K. ETP Group Boost
ETF Market Veterans Hector McNeil and Nik Bienkowski to Lead Build-Out of WisdomTree Europe
WisdomTree and Boost Product Ranges to Serve European Investors, Largest ETP Market After U.S. With More Than $400 Billion in AUM
January 31, 2014--WisdomTree Investments, Inc. (Nasdaq:WETF), an exchange-traded fund ("ETF") sponsor and asset manager with $34 billion in assets under management, announced today it will expand into Europe through a majority investment in U.K. based ETP provider Boost.
WisdomTree will invest $20 million in working capital to fund the build-out of a local European platform and operations to be led by ETF industry veterans Hector McNeil and Nik Bienkowski. Through this platform, WisdomTree intends to launch a select range of UCITS ETFs under the WisdomTree brand and continue to manage and grow the Boost lineup of short and leveraged fully collateralized ETPs under the Boost brand.
Source: WisdomTree
ICAP Seeks CFTC Oversight of London Swap-Trading Amid U.S. Suit
January 31, 2014--ICAP Plc (IAP) is seeking U.S. oversight of an overseas swap-trading platform a month after Wall Street lobbying groups sued the Commodity Futures Trading Commission trying to curb the agency's international reach.
ICAP, the world's largest broker of transactions between banks, wants to register a London-based platform with the CFTC to follow Dodd-Frank Act rules for swap-execution facilities and provide access to U.S. traders, according to an application submitted this month. The brokerage is the first large Sef platform to seek U.S. approval for an overseas-based entity.
Source: Bloomberg
Rules and regulations dog ETF managers
January 31, 2014--The reforms of regulation standards needed after the financial crisis have placed a heavy burden on the exchange traded funds industry.
Although ETFs performed well throughout the crisis, with none of the problems associated with more complex financial products such as credit default swaps, ETF providers have found their operations and business models subjected to much greater scrutiny.
Source: FT.com
EU meets with CFTC to contest Gensler cross-border derivatives measures
January 301, 2014--IN BRIEF
A European delegation planned to meet Thursday with US derivative
regulators to try to get them to reverse some of the final cross-border
trading measures approved by Gary Gensler, former US Commodity Futures
Trading Commission chairman.
The planned Washington meeting with CFTC staff followed higher-level discussions in Brussels last week between Acting CFTC Chairman Mark Wetjen and Jonathan Faull, the European Commission's top civil servant for financial services policy
Source: MLex
ESMA delivers second set of advice on EMIR equivalence
January 30, 2014--Following its technical advice published on 9 September 2013, the European Securities and Market Authority (ESMA) has published a supplement to its advice to the European Commission on the equivalence of the regulatory regime for central counterparties (CCPs) of Japan with the European Markets Infrastructure Regulation (EMIR).
This supplement to the September 2013 Final report sets out ESMA's advice to the European Commission is in respect of the equivalence between the Japanese regulatory regime for commodity CCPs and the regulatory regime for CCPs under EMIR.
Source: ESMA
