Daily ETF Watch: China Firm Plans Funds

China’s CSOP files paperwork with the SEC for ETF exemptive relief.

CSOP Asset Management has filed exemptive relief paperwork with the U.S. regulators outlining its plans to launch self-indexed funds on the U.S. market.

The filing requests permission to roll out index-based equity and fixed-income funds that can invest in foreign as well as domestic securities. The filing also makes allowances for funds using indexes from unaffiliated benchmark providers and for self-indexed funds.

CSOP is a Hong Kong-based subsidiary of a fund management company domiciled in mainland China. It has a handful of ETFs and mutual funds trading in Hong Kong, and its website says it has the most assets under management of any RMB qualified foreign institutional investor asset manager. CSOP was mentioned as the subadvisor in Exchange Traded Concepts’ filing for the CSOP Source FTSE China A50 ETF in January.

However, that particular fund may now fall under the umbrella of CSOP’s exemptive relief application. The initial fund described in the latest filing is the CSOP FTSE China A50 ETF, and it will track the same index as the fund in the ETC filing. The FTSE China A50 Price Index covers the largest securities in the China A-share market.

Ready To Launch
Two fund families appear to have offerings that are on the verge of launching:

• The PowerShares LadderRite 0-5 Year Corporate Bond Portfolio (LDRI) is set to make its debut on the Nasdaq Stock Market. The fund will replicate a laddered bond strategy with short- and intermediate-maturity domestic and foreign investment-grade bonds, according to the latest prospectus. LDRI comes with an expense ratio of 0.22 percent.
• ARK Investment Management has three funds ready to launch on the NYSE Arca. The ARK Genomic Revolution ETF (ARKG), ARK Industrial Innovation ETF (ARKQ) and ARK Web x.0 ETF (ARKW) are actively managed funds that will invest in innovations in the area of genomics, industry and technology infrastructure, respectively. Each fund comes with an expense ratio of 0.95 percent. A fourth fund in registration, the ARK Innovation ETF (ARKK), will invest in all three “disruptive” innovation areas, but may launch at a different time.