Vanguard Group has appointed Gregoire Blanc (pictured) as senior exchange-traded funds (ETF) capital markets specialist, in London.

In this newly created role, Blanc will be responsible for supporting the liquidity of Vanguard's products and helping clients achieve investment outcomes. Blanc reports to Thomas Merz, head of distribution, Europe ex UK, who is at the helm of the firm's ETF client support and product offering expansion across Europe. Blanc joins from Lyxor Asset Management where he spent nine years, most recently as head of ETF capital markets, also in London. In his latest role, Blanc managed a team overseeing 20% of reported turnover in European ETFs. Previously, he was an ETF broker/dealer sales. Blanc joined Lyxor from BNP Paribas where he had a nine month internship in the bank's structured products sales team in charge of the secondary market for structured products. Vanguard's European business had more than US$175 billion in assets under management (AUM) as of May 31.

WisdomTree offers investors exposure to Japan's local economy

WisdomTree has launched two exchange-traded funds (ETFs) - one offers exposure to the Japanese economy and the other is a smart beta multifactor fund.

The Japan SmallCap Dividend UCITS ETF tracks the WisdomTree Japan SmallCap Dividend Index, a proprietary index comprised of dividend-paying small capitalisation companies in Japan. Christopher Gannatti, WisdomTree head of research in Europe said, "After decades of deflation, deleveraging and demand contraction, Japan's domestic demand is now driving growth and Japanese small-caps have performed strongly across multiple time horizons in the past ten years." The fund is launched on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and has a net expense ratio of 0.48%.

The WisdomTree US Multifactor UCITS ETF is also launched on the LSE and tracks the price and yield performance of a proprietary index, the WisdomTree US Multifactor Index. "Our multi-factor approach ensures some exposure to momentum while also diversifying across other factors which may outperform in the coming periods," said Gannatti. The net expense ratio stands at 0.30%.

Cboe applies for crypto ETF licence

The Chicago Board Options Exchange (Cboe) Global Marketshas filed for a bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The futures exchange is seeking to target institutional investors to boost trading activity around cryptocurrencies

In June 2018, the SEC requested opinions from industry and market participants concerning the VanEck SolidX Bitcoin Trust, a joint project of financial companies VanEck and SolidX, which represented the third attempt by VanEck to launch a bitcoin ETF. This is not Cboe's first attempt to get regulatory clearance to market a bitcoin-related ETF. In December 2017, the exchange introduced bitcoin futures trading via the Cboe Gemini Bitcoin Futures Index, a strategy performance benchmark designed to replicate a constant one-month position in Cboe XBTSM Bitcoin Futures.

UBS offers multi-factor equity exposure to global and eurozone markets

UBS Asset Management has launched two new multi-factor equity ETFs targeting the Eurozone equity market and stocks from developed global markets.

Both funds seek to capture the returns attributed to six risk premia - momentum, value, quality, shareholder yield, volatility and size. The UBS MSCI EMU Select Factor Mix UCITS ETF invests in small, mid and large-cap stocks from ten developed market eurozone countries by tracking the MSCI EMU Select Factor Mix Index. The index is constructed by combining the weights of constituents in six single factor indices based on the MSCI EMU Index. Each index is assigned an equal contribution at every quarterly rebalance. The fund reinvests income generated within its portfolio and charges a total expense ratio (TER) of 0.34%.

The UBS MSCI World Select Factor Mix UCITS ETF tracks the MSCI World Select Factor Mix Index, which follows a similar methodology to the Eurozone ETF index by combining six factor versions of the MSCI World Index. The MSCI World tracks stocks from 26 developed markets globally. The fund's TER is 0.46%. Both ETFs have been listed across various exchanges, including Xetra, London Stock Exchange, Six Swiss Exchange and Borsa Italiana.

Global ETP inflows in June worst since 2014

ETFs and ETPs listed globally gathered US$8.69Bn in net inflows in June, the lowest monthly amount since January 2014 when the global ETF/ETP industry experienced net outflows of US$6.25bn, according to ETFGI.

At the end of June 2018, the Global ETF/ETP industry had 7,430 ETFs/ETPs, with 14,237 listings, assets of US$4.9tr, from 376 providers listed on 70 exchanges in 57 countries. Due to market moves the assets invested in ETFs/ETPs listed globally decreased by 0.35% from US$5tr in May 2018 to US$4.9tr.

Equity ETFs/ETPs listed globally gathered net inflows of US$2.08bn in June bringing net inflows for 2018 to US$150.2bn, which is less than the US$239.5bn in net inflows at this point last year. Fixed Income ETFs and ETPs listed globally gathered net inflows of US$7.58bn in June, growing net inflows for 2018 to US$46.4bn which is less than the US$84.08bn in net inflows at this point last year. 

The majority of these flows can be attributed to the top 20 ETFs by net new assets, which collectively gathered US$105.43bn during 2018. The iShares Core MSCI EAFE ETF (IEFA US) on its own accounted for net inflows of US$18.07bn. Investors have tended to invest in core, market cap and lower cost ETFs in June 2018 with the iShares Core MSCI EAFE ETF (IEFA US) and Topix Exchange Traded Fund (1306 JP) capturing most of the flows.