On July 22nd, ALPS Advisors filed a preliminary prospectus for an actively-managed ETF that will focus on investing globally in fixed-income securities. The fund will be called the RiverFront Strategic Income Fund. ALPS Advisors was one of the first companies to actively market ETFs to the financial adviser community when ETFs were first launched in the US in the 90s. ALPS currently manages $92 million in ETF assets as of June 2010.
Grail Advisors
Roger Nusbaum, who runs the popular blog Random Roger, wrote in a post today that one area in which an actively-managed ETF could add some value is the financial sector. Roger makes the point that the financial sector is exactly the type where some active management would be beneficial to investors because of the number of potentially bad bets out there amongst banks. I couldn’t agree more.
Active ETFs | In Focus spoke in-person with Bill Thomas, who is the CEO of Grail Advisors. Grail currently has 7 actively-managed ETFs on the market and just recently announced a partnership with DoubleLine Capital, which is lead by the respected fixed-income manager – Jeffery Gundlach. Bill talks to us about their new partnership, Active ETF disclosure, prospects for mutual fund conversions.
Reported by Bloomberg, BlackRock iShares – by far the largest issuer of ETFs in the world – is now seeking approval from the SEC for actively-managed ETFs “that would keep some of their assets undisclosed”. If such a modification to the Active ETF structure gets approved by the SEC, many issuers and managers would be much more comfortable in bringing strong active managers to the Active ETF space without fear for their strategies being front-run.
On June 23rd, Grail Advisors filed a preliminary prospectus with the SEC for a new actively-managed ETF called the Grail DoubleLine Emerging Markets Fixed Income ETF which will be listed on the NYSE once approved and brought to market. The fund will be sub-advised by DoubleLine Capital LP’s portfolio manager, Luz M. Padilla, who will be responsible to the day-to-day investment decisions for the portfolio.
Grail filed a registration statement for an actively-managed ETF on May 17th, 2010 called the Grail Western Asset Enhanced Liquidity ETF. Grail currently has 7 different Active ETFs on the market with 3 different sub-advisors managing those funds. The Enhanced Liquidity ETF will be with a new manager, Western Asset Management, that had more than $478 billion in assets under management as of March 31, 2010.
ActiveETFs | InFocus spoke with – Bill Thomas,CEO of Grail Advisors. Grail currently has seven Actively-Managed ETFs on the market and just recently released a white paper on fixed-income ETFs, which can be found here. Bill chats with us about fixed-income ETFs, Grail’s business mode and details on the mutual fund conversion process Grail Advisors is attempting.
On April 20, Grail Advisors published a white paper on the topic of fixed-income ETFs and the potential for active management when it comes to bonds. The paper, titled “Fixed-Income ETFs: Bonds Get to Work”, is the second white paper put out by Grail Advisors, with the first one being about ETFs in general.
