PowerShares Set to Close 19 ETFs
PowerShares announced in a May 1, 2009 press release that it will be closing 19 of its ETFs, representing roughly 1% of Invesco PowerShares assets and will mainly include smaller funds representing slices of the market.
In light of recent market turmoil, many ETF industry commentators are saying the ETF market place is too crowded and grew faster than it was able to attract assets.
Bruce Bond, president and CEO of Invesco PowerShares, said this about the closings in the press release, “After carefully evaluating numerous factors including shareholder considerations, length of time on the market, asset levels, and the potential for future growth, we proposed closing certain portfolios that have not gained sufficient acceptance with investors.”
PowerShares closes some of the category of funds it is best known for, the FTSE RAFI Index tracking ETFs and 4 ETFs tracking Dynamic Intellidex Indexes.
12 of the closing ETFs are ETFs following the RAFI Indexes created by Robert Arnott, RAFI standing for Research Affiliates Fundamental Index, which weight index components by five fundamental factors. Fundamental indexing proponents propose that market capitalization weighted indexes tend to overload themselves with overvalued stocks, the opposite of what an investor would want to do. These weigh an index based on fundamental factors and not by market cap which is a function of price. The 12 ETFs are all sector funds and the PowerShares FTSE RAFI Asia Pacific ex-Japan Small-Mid Portfolio.
The other seven ETFs closing represent either small slices of the market or niche concepts like the PowerShares High Growth Rate Dividend Achievers Portfolio, PHJ, which seeks to track an index that includes 100 companies with the highest dividend growths rates who have increased their annual dividends for the last ten consecutive years.
The closing Process
ETFs have closed in the past and since ETF assets are held outside of the company’s balance sheet, in trust, ETF assets are returned to an ETF investor upon the issuing company closing for bankruptcy or the ETF closing.
As PowerShares has announced, it will begin the process of closing the funds in the first part of May. During this time, the funds will no longer be required to meet their investor objective of tracking the index but will be seeking to get best price and execution of the underlying securities. This will cause tracking error to increase.
As of May 19, 2009, the 19 closing ETFs will no longer allow new investors in the funds. Investors who hold the ETFs at the close of trading on May 18, 2009 will receive the NAV of the ETFs as of May 22, 2009 as a cash deposit in their brokerage accounts.
Up to the closing of the funds to new investors, on May 19, creation and redemption of the funds can still take place to ensure that the ETFs represent the basket of underlying securities, which will keep this period of ETF closing orderly. Investors will be able to trade the ETFs up to the closing of new investments and should seek receive prices close to NAV, which may include the using limit orders.
PowerShares Set to Close 19 ETFs
PowerShares announced in a May 1, 2009 press release that it will be closing 19 of its ETFs, representing roughly 1% of Invesco PowerShares assets and will mainly include smaller funds representing slices of the market.
In light of recent market turmoil, many ETF industry commentators are saying the ETF market place is too crowded and grew faster than it was able to attract assets.
Bruce Bond, president and CEO of Invesco PowerShares, said this about the closings in the press release, “After carefully evaluating numerous factors including shareholder considerations, length of time on the market, asset levels, and the potential for future growth, we proposed closing certain portfolios that have not gained sufficient acceptance with investors.”
PowerShares closes some of the category of funds it is best known for, the FTSE RAFI Index tracking ETFs and 4 ETFs tracking Dynamic Intellidex Indexes.
12 of the closing ETFs are ETFs following the RAFI Indexes created by Robert Arnott, RAFI standing for Research Affiliates Fundamental Index, which weight index components by five fundamental factors. Fundamental indexing proponents propose that market capitalization weighted indexes tend to overload themselves with overvalued stocks, the opposite of what an investor would want to do. These weigh an index based on fundamental factors and not by market cap which is a function of price. The 12 ETFs are all sector funds and the PowerShares FTSE RAFI Asia Pacific ex-Japan Small-Mid Portfolio.
The other seven ETFs closing represent either small slices of the market or niche concepts like the PowerShares High Growth Rate Dividend Achievers Portfolio, PHJ, which seeks to track an index that includes 100 companies with the highest dividend growths rates who have increased their annual dividends for the last ten consecutive years.
The closing Process
ETFs have closed in the past and since ETF assets are held outside of the company’s balance sheet, in trust, ETF assets are returned to an ETF investor upon the issuing company closing for bankruptcy or the ETF closing.
As PowerShares has announced, it will begin the process of closing the funds in the first part of May. During this time, the funds will no longer be required to meet their investor objective of tracking the index but will be seeking to get best price and execution of the underlying securities. This will cause tracking error to increase.
As of May 19, 2009, the 19 closing ETFs will no longer allow new investors in the funds. Investors who hold the ETFs at the close of trading on May 18, 2009 will receive the NAV of the ETFs as of May 22, 2009 as a cash deposit in their brokerage accounts.
Up to the closing of the funds to new investors, on May 19, creation and redemption of the funds can still take place to ensure that the ETFs represent the basket of underlying securities, which will keep this period of ETF closing orderly. Investors will be able to trade the ETFs up to the closing of new investments and should seek receive prices close to NAV, which may include the using limit orders.
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