The latest hot stuff from the AAII.
The Individual Investor's Guide to
the Top ETFs 2024
All but five of the 50 best-performing exchange-traded
funds (ETFs) for 2023 are from the digital assets, technology or growth
categories.
by AAII Staff | February 2024
- Digital assets,
technology and growth categories dominated the 50 best-performing ETFs in
2023
- ETF flows were driven
by trends such as passive investing, professional use and tax efficiency
- Actively managed ETFs
saw an increase, with tax efficiency a key factor, but they tend to be
smaller
Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) gained
steam in 2023. Net ETF flows—the difference between dollars invested and
dollars taken out—totaled $598.3 billion in 2023, according to Morningstar.
This is on par with net flows of $597.9 billion for 2022. Both are 33% less
than $902.6 billion in net flows that ETFs realized in 2021. Attractive yields
in money market funds and other short-term cash assets damped 2023 inflows.
ETF returns mostly rebounded back into positive territory.
Within the equity asset class categories included in the print version of this
guide, only the utilities and miscellaneous sector categories realized losses
in 2023. (In comparison, only two categories realized gains in 2022.) On the
fixed-income side, all categories posted gains. In total, just under 13% of all
ETFs with full-year returns fell in value in 2023, compared to 90% with
negative returns for 2022.
There are three broad trends driving growth in ETF flows.
The first is the ongoing shift toward passively managed investments. The
majority of ETFs, and particularly the largest ETFs, continue to track indexes.
Out of our universe of approximately 3,300 ETFs, 60% track an index. The second
trend is the use of ETFs by financial advisers, asset allocators and tactical
portfolio managers. ETFs provide targeted exposure at low expenses in a vehicle
that can be easily traded, thereby lessening the need to handpick individual
securities. The third trend is the comparative tax-efficiency of ETFs relative
to mutual funds.
The preference for tax-efficiency is exhibited by the
increase in the number of actively managed exchange-traded funds. There were
1,362 ETFs in our universe not designated as index ETFs by Morningstar at the
end of 2023, 30% more than at the end of 2022. The median tax-cost ratio for
actively managed ETFs in existence long enough to calculate it is 0.7%.
These funds tend to be neither large nor cheap as a group.
The median actively managed ETF had $52.5 million in total assets and charged
an average expense ratio of 0.73%. (Pushing the median for total assets upward
were 95 actively managed ETFs with at least $1 billion in total assets.)
Approximately 12,000 shares of the median actively managed ETF were traded on
the average day.
Actively managed ETFs expanded their reach in 2023,
representing $131.1 billion in flows. BlackRock and Vanguard, the two largest
providers, launched actively managed fixed-income ETFs in what the industry
sees as a potential growth area. Vanguard’s patent on its hybrid mutual
fund/ETF structure expired in May 2023, which may open the door for active fund
managers to offer ETF share classes. Dimensional Fund Advisors and Fidelity
have both applied for this structure but have yet to be approved by the U.S. Securities
and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Expanded
ETF Data interactive lists
of funds by category and detailed data on each fund. Spreadsheets for each
asset class can be accessed under Expanded Fund Listings.
Performance Tables
- Table 1. Top 50 ETF Performers for 2023
- Table 2. Bottom 50 ETF Performers for 2023
- Table 3. Performance of the 50 Largest ETFs
- Table 4. Top ETFs by Category
While past performance is no
indication of future performance, it may attest to the quality and consistency
of fund management.
No comments:
Post a Comment