It is now no secret to investors and the ETF industry that Vanguard will be moving completely away from utilizing MSCI Indices as their benchmark link for all of their ETFs in the near future, instead shifting over to FTSE and CRSP indices respectively.
Thus, it would be hard to deny the pick up in iShares creation activity (asset inflows) in a number of products in recent sessions, including those such as EEM, IVV (iShares S&P 500) and EFA (iShares MSCI EAFE).
Specifically on the EAFE front, a variant of the MSCI EAFE index, the MSCI EAFE Value Index, was reasonably active late last week as linked ETF, EFV (iShares MSCI EAFE Value) attracted more than $55 million in net new assets (equivalent to approximately 3% of assets outstanding in the fund).
The ETF, which typically averages 147,000 shares traded daily, has seen volume surge in the past few weeks including one single session where north of 2 million shares traded.
EFV, as its name would suggest, focuses on the “Value” categorized equities within the universe of MSCI EAFE, whereas sister fund EFG (iShares EAFE Growth) is a way to get exposure to the “Growth” side of EAFE.