Weekly ETF Inflows Tepid

Senior ETF Analyst

Apr 27, 2018

Reviewed by: Sumit Roy

Edited by: Sumit Roy

After several weeks of intense positioning, investors took a breather this week. On net, they left their ETF holdings little changed—only adding $972 million in new money to the space during the week ending Thursday, April 26. That pushed year-to-date inflows slightly higher to $81.5 billion.

As has largely been the case all year long, ETF flows followed the market. Despite seeing big moves up and down during the week, the S&P 500 finished the week close to unchanged—mirroring flows.

With the Q2 earnings season in full swing, corporations have been hitting it out of the park. According to Bloomberg, 82% of companies that have reported so far have beaten estimates, the largest percentage on record. However, nagging concerns about trade, slowing growth overseas, and interest rates offset the rosy-profits picture.

Meanwhile, as the stock market stalled, the bond market saw action. The U.S. 10-year Treasury yield hit a four-year high of 3.04% on Wednesday before backing down to last trade at 2.96% on Friday.

‘SPTM’ Assets Increase By A Quarter

Taking a look at individual ETFs, the iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (IVV), the iShares Core MSCI EAFE ETF (IEFA) and the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (TLT) were the week’s biggest inflows winners.

On a percentage basis, the SPDR Portfolio Total Stock Market ETF (SPTM) had the largest jump, with an AUM increase of 24%.

On the other side of the ledger, the PowerShares QQQ Trust (QQQ), the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) and the iShares Russell 2000 ETF (IWM) were the ETFs with the largest outflows during the week.

For a full list of this week’s top inflows and outflows, see the tables below:

Top 10 Creations (All ETFs)

Ticker	Name	Net Flows ($,mm)	AUM ($, mm)	AUM % Change
IVV	iShares Core S&P 500 ETF	1,852.17	142,094.43	1.32%
IEFA	iShares Core MSCI EAFE ETF	1,310.63	58,408.59	2.30%
TLT	iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF	828.26	7,634.10	12.17%
AGG	iShares Core U.S. Aggregate Bond ETF	604.66	55,542.03	1.10%
LQD	iShares iBoxx $ Investment Grade Corporate Bond ETF	575.13	32,227.73	1.82%
SHV	iShares Short Treasury Bond ETF	485.28	13,843.97	3.63%
XLF	Financial Select Sector SPDR Fund	429.43	32,669.89	1.33%
XLP	Consumer Staples Select Sector SPDR Fund	423.39	7,575.89	5.92%
IEF	iShares 7-10 Year Treasury Bond ETF	374.37	8,775.90	4.46%
SPTM	SPDR Portfolio Total Stock Market ETF	357.49	1,844.32	24.04%

Top 10 Redemptions (All ETFs)

Ticker	Name	Net Flows ($,mm)	AUM ($, mm)	AUM % Change
QQQ	PowerShares QQQ Trust	-1,961.92	58,549.60	-3.24%
SPY	SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust	-1,824.61	251,411.35	-0.72%
IWM	iShares Russell 2000 ETF	-1,056.97	42,482.35	-2.43%
HYG	iShares iBoxx $ High Yield Corporate Bond ETF	-682.39	14,447.77	-4.51%
XLK	Technology Select Sector SPDR Fund	-616.21	19,431.68	-3.07%
XLI	Industrial Select Sector SPDR Fund	-601.28	12,748.07	-4.50%
JNK	SPDR Bloomberg Barclays High Yield Bond ETF	-556.87	9,021.86	-5.81%
XLY	Consumer Discretionary Select Sector SPDR Fund	-469.82	12,693.87	-3.57%
DIA	SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF Trust	-391.58	20,902.64	-1.84%
VNQ	Vanguard Real Estate ETF	-327.88	28,688.71	-1.13%

ETF Weekly Flows By Asset Class

	Net Flows ($, mm)	AUM ($, mm)	% of AUM
U.S. Equity	-3,223.92	1,898,203.60	-0.17%
International Equity	1,839.22	840,681.97	0.22%
U.S. Fixed Income	2,612.60	533,043.96	0.49%
International Fixed Income	-168.52	63,723.93	-0.26%
Commodities	439.37	71,016.63	0.62%
Currency	0.00	157.49	0.00%
Leveraged	-23.45	34,720.97	-0.07%
Inverse	-209.60	13,764.85	-1.52%
Asset Allocation	17.03	9,120.79	0.19%
Alternatives	-310.25	4,218.97	-7.35%
Total:	972.49	3,468,653.17	0.03%

Top 10 Volume Surprises, Funds >$50 mm AUM

Ticker	Name	Average Volume (30 Day)	1 Week Average Volume	% of Average
IGN	iShares North American Tech-Multimedia Networking ETF	16,511	66,417	402.26%
TBX	ProShares Short 7-10 Year Treasury	61,884	170,558	275.61%
MEAR	iShares Short Maturity Municipal Bond ETF	13,528	42,743	315.97%
HDMV	First Trust Horizon Managed Volatility Developed International ETF	14,781	37,258	252.07%
EIRL	iShares MSCI Ireland ETF	11,397	27,988	245.58%
IAI	iShares U.S. Broker-Dealers & Securities Exchanges ETF	90,416	215,281	238.10%
TLTE	FlexShares Morningstar Emerging Markets Factor Tilt Index	27,761	59,622	214.77%
WOOD	iShares Global Timber & Forestry ETF	59,135	124,287	210.17%
JPSE	JPMorgan Diversified Return U.S. Small Cap Equity ETF	19,733	34,643	175.56%
DOO	WisdomTree International Dividend ex-Financials Fund	9,815	15,654	159.49%

Disclaimer: All data as of 6 a.m. Eastern time the date the article is published. Data is believed to be accurate; however, transient market data is often subject to subsequent revision and correction by the exchanges.

Sumit Roy

| Contact: [email protected]

Sumit Roy is the senior ETF analyst for etf.com, where he has worked for 13 years. He creates a variety of content for the platform, including news articles, analysis pieces, videos and podcasts.

Before joining etf.com, Sumit was the managing editor and commodities analyst for Hard Assets Investor. In those roles, he was responsible for most of the operations of HAI, a website dedicated to education about commodities investing.

Though he still closely follows the commodities beat, Sumit covers a much broader assortment of topics for etf.com, with a particular focus on stock and bond exchange-traded funds.

He is the host of etf.com’s Talk ETFs, a popular video series that features weekly interviews with thought leaders in the ETF industry. Sumit is also co-host of Exchange Traded Fridays, etf.com’s weekly podcast series.

He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, where he enjoys climbing the city’s steep hills, playing chess and snowboarding in Lake Tahoe.

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Weekly ETF Inflows Tepid

Weekly ETF Inflows Tepid

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