State Street teams with MFS to open its first active stock ETFs

State Street Corp., the second-biggest provider of exchange-traded funds, plans to introduce its first actively managed stock ETFs in partnership with MFS Investment Management. The three funds, the SPDR MFS Systematic Core Equity ETF, Growth Equity ETF and Value Equity ETF, will open Thursday on the New York Stock Exchange, according to a statement yesterday from NYSE Euronext. Fund companies for years have contemplated ways to combine the security selection of active mutual funds with the ease of trading and cost savings of ETFs, most of which track indexes. The transparency of ETFs, which are required to reveal all their holdings daily, has discouraged many would-be providers and equity investors. Actively managed funds account for about $14.7 billion, or 0.9% of U.S. ETF assets, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. State Street offers 197 ETFs holding $413 billion in assets, second only to BlackRock Inc.'s $898 billion, according to the data. MFS, manager of the first open-end mutual fund in the U.S., oversaw $413 billion in assets as of Dec. 31, according to Daniel Flaherty, a spokesman. MFS is a unit of Sun Life Financial Inc. (Bloomberg News)