iShares/Claymore Marriage – ETFs – Blog

The Canadian ETF field has gotten more top-heavy following the announcement of BlackRock’s acquisition of Claymore Investments, Canada’s second largest ETF provider. In the past three years, Claymore’s ETF asset base has grown by $5.7 billion to $6.7 billion at 2011 year-end, driven by rapid expansion in the issuer’s popular fixed income ETFs. Combined, the two firms controlled 83% of $43.2 billion invested in Canadian-listed ETFs at the end of 2011. The acquisition will deepen BlackRock’s penetration of retail distribution channels. The bulk of Claymore’s assets are held by clients of full-service brokerage advisors, a channel in which BlackRock has seen a 10 percentage point share retrenchment between June 2010 and June 2011. Meanwhile, Claymore’s growing presence in the channel has led it to capture nearly one-quarter (22.6%) of all Canadian ETF assets held by the full-service brokerage channel. Combined, the two firms collectively accounted for $9 our of every $10 of ETF assets held by the full-service brokerage channel (June 2011 data). The cited metrics are derived from Investor Economics’ ETF holdings database which tracks the holdings of Canadian- and U.S.-listed ETFs in the online/discount brokerage, full-service brokerage and private investment counselor (PIC) channels. For more information on news and developments concerning Canadian ETF segment, please see the latest issue of ETF and Index Funds Report at http://investoreconomics.com/issue/fall-2011-etf-and-index-funds-report. Posted by Sandeep Gosal Sandeep@iei.ca.