The global ETF market enjoyed encouraging inflows in September, with more than EUR 42.8 billion of net new money going into the equity ETF sector worldwide.
According to data from Europe's largest asset manager Amundi, provided in its monthly market flows analysis of ETFs, these inflows were driven by North American equities. These stocks provided a EUR 32.3 billion boost, followed by global exposures which added EUR 5.9 billion.
Total net flows reached EUR 70 billion, with equities benefiting from a EUR 42.8 billion boost and fixed income experiencing inflows of EUR 22.5 billion.
Nevertheless, it wasn’t an exclusively rosy picture with global performance not reflecting hardships faced elsewhere. In contrast to the EUR 17.8 billion total net flows in Europe, Japanese equities suffered outflows of EUR1.2 billion, while emerging market equities saw EUR 2.2 billion leave the market in September.
These performance setbacks were more than offset by positive performance in key ETF sectors. In fixed income positive inflows resulted in EUR 22.5 billion net new assets. Within the asset class, investors favoured corporate bonds which attracted over EUR 11.8 billion of inflows, followed by aggregate bonds which raised close to EUR 7 billion of net new assets.
European flows
Equities experienced a EUR 12.3 billion boost, with European investors keen on world (EUR 5.3 billion) and North American ( EUR 4.6 billion) exposures. Meanwhile, SRI equity exposures maintained a positive position in September with EUR 289 million inflows. In addition, smart beta ETFs saw positive flows of EUR 122 million. Amundi’s research also shows that when analysing single country exposures, there are positive flows for UK equities of approximately EUR 1.7bn. Thematic ETFs, AI & robotics also gathered EUR 313 million of inflows.
Bonds also enjoyed a positive month, with EUR 5 billion inflows. European Government Debt ETFs continue to be the most popular with EUR 2.2 billion inflows, while investors are also keen on emerging markets debt, which gathered EUR 1.2 billion of net new assets, followed by USA exposures that saw more than EUR 1 billion of inflows. Corporate bonds also saw EUR 1.5 billion of inflows, with investors putting EUR 733 million of net new assets into the Eurozone.
