Amundi ETF Trend Report Overview - Q4 2019

Tuesday 14 January 2020

Expertise, Video

       

  
Following last summer’s turning point, net new assets on the European ETF market have continued to accelerate in the fourth quarter to finally land above 100 billion euros. If most of the flows were concentrated on fixed income in the first half, it was equities that largely dominated investments in the second part of the year.

All major areas indeed saw positive flows over the past three months, and only the Euro zone remains in the red for the year. Market sentiment became significantly more positive at the end of the year, leading investors to favor risky assets.
The decline in tensions between China and the United States, the unwinding of the Brexit saga and the smooth succession of Mario Draghi at the head of the European Central Bank are all events that contributed to the return of a positive sentiment.
This context of reallocation stressed out one of the main trends of the year: the success of responsible investment, which ultimately represents 25% of all equity flows observed in 2019.
  
Regarding bonds, there’s been no major change in the trend between the beginning and the end of the year, as the central theme remained the search for yield. It mainly benefited corporate bonds, which were allocated more than 28 billion euros in 2019.
Aggregate ETFs, which combine private and public debt, have also been favored by investors thanks to their balanced exposure which results in a higher yield than government debt but a lower risk than corporate bonds.
Finally, responsible investment was also a significant trend in the fixed income universe, with 4 billion euros of new assets this year. 

In the commodity universe, gold is undeniably the big winner: in the face of the various events that have agitated the markets this year, it played its natural safe haven role and was allocated almost 7 billion euros.