The US election and ETFs

Our writer Peter Taberner has taken on the subject of the upcoming US election and its likely impact on ETFs this week, quoting Gavin Filmore, the chief revenue officer at Tidal Financial Group, who says: "Our house view is overwhelmingly that the ETF market is indirectly impacted per se, for example top line growth that can be more driven by markets rather than political headwinds."

Tom Bailey, head of research at HANetf, comments on the election, from the context of their Defence ETF, saying: "While a Harris administration is likely to be much more committed to NATO and the US’ historic alliances, the election itself has raised broad long-term concerns about the US taking a more isolationist turn.

"So, with defence, we think it is less about individual personalities and more about this long-term structural trend," he says.

Collateralised loan obligations (CLOs) are suddenly the most fashionable thing in ETF form and we cover the subject with our interview with PGIM’s Matt Collins. He explains that the sector has cleaned up its act, throwing off its bad image from 2008 with significant restructuring, particularly in the AAA part of the market. Investment grade CLOs have seen assets increase by over USD5 billion year to date, now totalling USD14 billion.

We also brought you Research in Finance’s latest European survey of ETFs, which found exactly where the problems lie in promoting ETFs across Europe. The survey quotes a private banker from France who was interviewed for EuroFSS, who said: "We are looking to offer ETFs in future, but the problem is that we run on retrocessions, and we’d have to charge very low fees to sell ETFs, which doesn’t currently fit with our business model."

There is work to be done, for sure.

And we are very happy to be able to offer readers a discount at an event. This code, ETF20, will gain you a 20 per cent discount on tickets to attend RAO Global’s symposium on 21st November in London. The event details are here.

Beverly Chandler, Managing Editor

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