Mutual funds

While Guinness Atkinson pursues the first full mutual fund-to-ETF conversion, similar moves have begun elsewhere in the fund industry.

The fund industry's latest arrivals underline the seismic shifts underway in the business of asset management.

If clients “looked just three months ago, these numbers would be glaringly different,” an expert says.

The funds have recorded $248 billion in net inflows in 2020, up about 5% from this time last year.

The 20 top-performers have generated gains well over 50% in the first seven months of the year.

The firm allegedly didn't disclose its parent company paid a teacher union entity $10,000 a month “for its exclusive endorsement” as its preferred financial services partner, according to the regulator.

“No one could have envisioned what this virus was going to do to the commercial real estate space,” an expert says.

Investors may be put off by the costs associated with these funds, which had an average expense ratio of more than triple their peers.

Almost 90% of smaller fund managers would no longer have to report their investments and their firms would save $136 million a year, the agency estimates.

The firm announced plans in March to acquire $200 million of its stock and has been in the market on average once every three trading days since.

As more active strategies embrace the exchange-traded model, the landscape may be shifting.

The funds had posted gains over the past decade, but have suffered losses amid this year's coronavirus-driven volatility.

Still, clients continue to invest their assets into the industry’s cheapest funds and are saving billions as a result.

As asset managers launch funds with this new structure, lack of familiarity may hinder advisors’ adoption of them.

"It's now June and if you’ve been on a deserted island for the last five months you couldn’t have fathomed the movements we’ve seen," an expert says.

Wild market swings have given many active managers a rare respite after a decade-long battle against the rise of passive investing.

It’s the regulator’s largest restitution order this year.

The decade’s top performers also outpaced broader markets over the short term.

The results were “not just predicated on expense ratios,” an expert says.

“Just because someone’s charging 1% doesn’t mean you should take them off your list,” an expert says.