Rumors of Target-Date ETFs’ Demise Have Been Greatly Exaggerated
February 28th at 12:00pm by Tom Lydon
Let’s get this straight: No target-date exchange traded funds (ETFs) are closing.
However, portfolio provider XTF Advisors is shutting down its lineup of target-date ETF portfolios.
Since Claymore’s announcement that it’s booting 11 of its weakest-performing ETFs, you’ll forgive the alarm these days when investors see "closing" and "ETFs" in the same sentence.
We repeat: No other ETFs are actually closing this time.
"No animals have been injured in this movie," says Jeffrey Feldman, chairman of XShares. XShares has nothing to do with XTF, but somehow in the spreading of the news, their similar-sounding names were linked. XShares currently offers the only target-date ETFs in the marketplace through its line of TDAX products.
Feldman set the record straight: "They went out of business for reasons totally unrelated to ETFs. There was an inability to raise capital. They had a very good business model, but they never built or managed ETFs."
Meanwhile, State Street Global Advisors filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to launch a series of actively managed target-date ETFs, reports Stacy Schultz for On Wall Street. They’re going to be a "fund of funds" and hold other ETFs, according to Matthew Hougan for Index Universe.
The XShares line consists of ETFs of stocks and bonds – analogous but different products, Feldman says.
