ETFs

Schwab has lowered fees on all of its fifteen proprietary exchange-traded funds, Marie Chandoha, president, Charles Schwab Investment Management., said during a monthly media briefing Friday.

Fidelity Investments seems to be not-so-secretly building its long-awaited foray into the exchange-traded fund market out West, after hiring an executive and creating a new division in Denver.

Equity mutual fund investors pulled $1.3 billion from their accounts (their fifth straight week of outflows), while equity ETF investors made a U-turn from the previous week's withdrawal numbers and added a $12.1 billion to their accounts for the week ended Sept. 12.

ALPS Advisors this week revealed that it is teaming up with Goldman, Sachs & Co. to collaborate on exchange-traded products. ALPS will license Goldman Sachs' proprietary indices, which will be used as benchmarks to create exchange traded funds.

AdvisorShares is launching the STAR Global Buy-Write ETF (VEGA), which will begin trading on Sept. 18 on the NYSE's Archipelago Exchange.

ETF managed portfolios-those that typically have more than 50% of portfolio assets invested in ETFs-are one of the fastest-growing segments of the managed account sector, according to a newly released Morningstar report.

U.S. exchange-traded fund assets totaled $1.2 trillion as of August 31 - up 16.6% year-to-date, according to State Street Global Advisors' ETF Snapshot.

BlackRock is cutting fees for its large exchange-traded funds next quarter in response to pricing pressure from the Vanguard Group, Bloomberg reports.

Herb Morgan has a good barometer to tell how hot the market for exchange-traded funds is getting.

Global assets invested in exchange-traded funds and exchange-traded products eclipsed the $1.7 trillion threshold in August - an all-time high.

Global exchange-traded fund assets have increased by 13.9% from $1.35 trillion to $1.54 trillion year-to-date, through the end of July 2012.

Fixed income ETPs now account for 18% of global ETP assets, up from 7% in 2007 at the onset of the financial crisis, according to BlackRock. Bond ETPs garnered a 35% share of industry flows in the first seven months of 2012, according to a BlackRock report on the fixed income ETP landscape. …

After peaking at over $1,900 an ounce in August 2011, gold prices are now down around 12% from that apex. However, investors' demand for gold bullion ETFs has not dulled.

The inclusion of alternative ETFs in a portfolio provides a risk-adjusted benefit to investors, according to research from Lipper.

Legg Mason is planning to offer a number of index ETFs as well as actively managed fund of funds ETFs.

Columbia Management is planning to further expand into the actively managed ETF space with 17 new ETFs.

Russell Investments is planning to close its family of 25 passively managed ETFs. The firm will continue to operate the Russell Equity ETF.

BMO Asset Management is changing the investment objectives of several ETFs. The biggest change involves switching two of the ETFs to more recognized indices. In both cases, the firm is moving from Dow Jones indices to S&P benchmarks.

Midsized RIA firms are the new sweet spot for managers of mutual funds and ETFs, according to a new report from Cerulli Associates.

Equity fund investors appear to be exiting from mutual funds and investing in ETFs instead. The ICI reported net redemptions of $64.673 billion for U.S. equity funds and $42.887 billion for all equity funds for the year to date.