ETF assets surged last month, hit record $695B

Exchange-traded-fund assets reached an all-time high of $695 billion at the end of last month, according to data released today by State Street Global Advisors. The 12 ETF categories tracked by SSgA all gained assets for the month. The international category rose the most in absolute terms, up $12.6 billion, or 8.4%. Assets in the size and style categories were up $4.7 billion, or 1.9%. Gains were concentrated in the mid-cap and small-cap categories, while large-cap ETF assets fell slightly more than $2 billion. All ten sectors tracked by SSgA gained assets in the period. The materials sector saw assets jump 15.5% for the month, while industrials climbed 14.6%. The top three managers in the ETF marketplace as of Sept. 30 continued to be Barclays Global Investors, SSgA and The Vanguard Group Inc. They accounted for 84.3% of the assets in the ETF market. Average ETF daily volume remained fairly stable at $60 billion, according to SsgA. The top-three ETFs in terms of dollar volume traded for the month were the SPDR S&P 500 (SPY) with an average daily volume of $16.8 billion, Invesco PowerShares QQQ (QQQQ) with $4.1 billion and iShares Russell 2000 (IWM) with $2.678 billion. The top three ETFs in terms of assets were: SPDR S&P 500 (SPY) with $70.63 billion, SPDR Gold Shares (GLD) with $35.43 billion, and iShares MSCI EAFE (EFA) with $34.31 billion.