Nearly a year after the launch of its first exchange traded fund, the Vident International Equity Fund (NasdaqGM: VIDI), Atlanta-based Vident Financial has raced to $1 billion in assets under management.
Impressively, the firm has needed just three ETFs, two of which debuted this year and one of which, the Vident Core U.S. Bond Strategy ETF (NasdaqGS: VBND), is not even a month old, to achieve the lofty $1 billion in assets under management milestone.
VIDI, Vident’s oldest ETF and one of the most successful ETFs to launch last year, is also the firm’s largest fund with over $712 million in AUM. VIDI has proven so successful so rapidly that late last month, just days shy of the ETF’s first anniversary, Vident said it will reduce VIDI’s annual expense ratio to 0.68% from 0.75%. VIDI’s new annual expense ratio will go into effect on March 1, 2015. [Vident Lowers Fees on its Largest ETF]
VIDI tracks the Vident Intenational Equity Index (VIE), which evaluates constituent countries “across growth, sound money, political stability and value factors. VIE rebalances twice a year and “seeks to reduce country, currency, and company concentration risks that can sometimes be typical amongst traditional capitalization-weighted approaches,” according to the issuer.
The Vident Core US Equity ETF (NasdaqGS: VUSE), which debuted in January, has nearly $191 million in assets under management, making it one of the most successful new ETFs to come to market in 2014. Just a handful of ETFs that have debuted in 2014 have outpaced VUSE in terms of asset gathering. [Another Good Year for new ETFs]
The Vident Core U.S. Equity Index, VUSE’s underlying benchmark, starts its selection universe with 3,000 companies with market values of at least $500 million and average daily volume of at least $1.5 million. From there, the top 80% as ranked by corporate governance, financial reporting and expense recognition are selected.