5 More ETFs To Close

Another five ETF closures were announced recently by United States Commodity Funds and Hartford Funds. All of the funds will shut down during the first half of September.

Commodity Fund Closures

USCF has marked three of its funds for elimination. The United States Diesel-Heating Oil Fund (UHN), the United States Short Oil Fund LP (DNO) and the United States Agriculture Index Fund (USAG) will all see their last day of trading on Sept. 6.

The trio of funds were all launched in 2012 or earlier and the largest has less than $11 million in assets under management. With their closures, USCF will have a total of 10 ETFs listed on the U.S. market.

Fixed-Income Shutdowns

The Hartford Quality Bond ETF (HQBD) and the Hartford Corporate Bond ETF (HCOR) will both see their last day of trading on Sept. 15. The two funds are actively managed and originally launched in March 2017.

HQBD has nearly $20 million in assets management, but its performance over the past 12 months has been fairly dismal relative to the broader bond market, with expectations muted for the fixed-income space going forward remaining muted. Meanwhile, HCOR has nearly $15 million in assets and has also exhibited poor performance.

Another Record Year?

Closures are moving at a rapid pace this year, currently nearing 100 completed shutdowns before the first eight months of the year are over. Last year, fewer than 70 funds had shut down by the end of August. Much of that difference can be accounted for by the 50 ETNs that were closed by Barclays’ iPath unit back in April. Without that wave of shutdowns, 2018 would be conspicuous for its lower level of closures.

In all, 2017 saw nearly 140 ETFs shut down, and given the current pace, we can probably look forward to another record broken at the end of 2018.

Contact Heather Bell at [email protected]