For quite a few years now, exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have been a favorite product of both individual and institutional investors. Their strong growth in market capitalization and sales numbers since their original inception in the U.S. in 1993 has been astounding, especially in recent years. This alone should be sufficient to show that there must be something to ETFs that makes them a gain for almost every portfolio. Let us take a look what the reasons are for investing in these instruments.
Exchange-traded funds offer a great way to diversify your investments. As is well known, diversification is a key strategy to lower the overall risk inherent in an investment portfolio. ETFs make it easy to invest in whole markets at a time, even those which are usually inaccessible to small individual investors. For example, not only are ETFs available for the US equity market, but also for Asian stocks like a Nikkei ETF and for specific industrial sectors. Even for niche markets like the nuclear industry, there exists a uranium ETF which tracks the development of this market.
The management costs of an exchange-traded fund are much lower than for comparable mutual funds. This is mainly due to their passive approach to investing, meaning that ETFs simply try to replicate the performance of their underlying index without the need for elaborate management strategies. In addition to the fact that ETFs have a much lower need for trading activity than mutual funds because of their exchange-traded nature, this leads to an expense ratio typically between 0.5% and 1.0%.
Finally, the internal tax efficiency of ETFs is better due to the above mentioned reduced need for trading activity. As less taxable transactions occur, a higher proportion of the invested funds can be retained within the ETF’s holdings.
As these arguments show, ETFs have become the most popular exchange-traded product for a reason. Their ongoing success story is likely to stay that way in the coming years, making especially large, well-established ETFs a perfect basis for any long-term investment strategy.
