A Precipitous Drop in ETF Flows

Flows into exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in the trailing 12 months ending March 31 were largely a movement to the two giants, BlackRock and The Vanguard Group, which led in terms of ETF assets under management (AUM) overall. The former garnished $125.7 billion and the latter, $81.7 billion, according to Strategic Insight, an ISS company. Still, these flows are far less than the $203.2 billion that BlackRock attracted to its ETFs in 2017 and the $138.2 that Vanguard gained.

In fact, flows to all of the top 20 ETF managers dropped off significantly last year and early this year. Of those ranked below Vanguard, ETF managers suffered precipitous declines in ETF flows during the same trailing 12 months, with $25.7 billion going to Schwab, $17.1 to JPMorgan Funds, and $7.1 billion to First Trust Advisors.

In total, the top 20 ETF managers took in $283.9 billion worth of net flows in the 12 months ended March 31, bringing their total assets up to $2.8 trillion. By comparison, the top 20 mutual fund managers netted nearly double that amount, $534.4 billion, in those 12 months, boosting their assets to $12.6 trillion.

Given that BlackRock and Vanguard are behemoths, it should be no surprise that the top 10 ETFs with the highest inflows are all those companies’ products.