Hong Kong
Premia Partners lists innovative tech ETFs
Hong Kong-based ETF newcomer Premia Partners is building out its thematic and smart beta offering, listing two new ETFs that focus on Asian niches.
- Premia Asia Innovative Technology ETF (3181, 918)
- Premia Emerging ASEAN Titans 100 ETF (2810, 9810)
The Asian innovation ETF uses a FactSet index to look at Asian companies R&D investment and revenues. From there, it tries to identify which Asian companies are likely to be innovative. Of particular interest are companies involved in “digital transformation, healthcare & life science and automation & robotics,” a factsheet circulated by Premia indicates. Companies selected will be equally weighted in order to “reduce buy high sell low impact of pure market cap approach and minimize concentration in a few top holdings.”
The ASEAN Titans ETF will track an index put together by Dow Jones and offer exposure to 100 of the largest companies in Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. The same factsheet indicates the ETF aims to offer exposure to changing demographics in Asia and an alternative to China as the trade war bites.
USA
JPMorgan beefs up “BetaBuilders” subbrand
The world’s largest financial institution is beefing up its low-cost ETF offering, rolling out two new funds that offer country and region-specific exposure.
- JPMorgan BetaBuilders Developed Asia ex-Japan ETF (BBAX)
- JPMorgan BetaBuilders Canada ETF (BBCA)
Both new funds track indexes built by Morningstar in yet another sign that its entering endgame for big index houses in the plain vanilla space.
BBAX will track an index of “developed Asian” countries. A category which – perhaps to the surprise of Aussies and Kiwis – includes Australia and New Zealand. The index is weighted by market capitalisation and contains 169 companies. BBAX will charge 0.19%.
BBCA will track the 90 biggest Canadian companies and offer plain vanilla exposure to Canadian companies. BBCA will charge 0.19%.
In other parts of its BetaBuilders brand, JPMorgan has met with success. The companies Japan ETF (BBJP) has eaten up billions in assets in its short time on exchange. And gobbled up these billions despite being more expensive than similar products from Franklin Templeton and Xtrackers.
