Charles Schwab (NYSE: SCHW) is seeing more of its clients warm to exchange traded funds as investors are embracing equity funds while departing some bond and commodity plays.
At the end of the third quarter, ETF assets custodied at Schwab reached $179 billion, up 22% on a year-over-year basis, a clip that is enough to outpace industry growth of 19%, Schwab said in its third-quarter Investor Snapshot released Wednesday.
Retail Traders captured 6% of the 12-month ETF Flows, while retail investors and RIA Clients split the remaining 94%. U.S. and International Equity ETFs represented almost 90% of the ETF flows in Q3, a consistent trend across all client segments, according to Schwab data.
Schwab’s reputation as one of the low-cost leaders in the ETF industry could be one reason for the significant jump in ETF assets now custodied at the firm. Last week, the company added 16 new ETFs including five from Guggenheim, five from SPDR ETFs and six from Charles Schwab Investment Management, to its Schwab ETF OneSource platform of commission-free ETF offerings. [Schwab Adds Commission-Free ETFs to OneSource Lineup]
OneSource now features 121 ETFs on a commission-free basis. In addition to funds from the aforementioned issuers, Schwab ETF OneSource features ETFs from PowerShares, the fourth-largest U.S. ETF sponsor, ETF Securities and U.S. Commodity Funds. [Schwab Unveils Game-Changing ETF Platform]
For the trailing 12-month period, Schwab said its clients pulled capital from long-duration and high-yield bond ETFs, but bank loan and short-duration funds saw inflows. Not surprisingly, Schwab clients pulled money from gold ETFs, but flows to silver funds were steady. [Silver ETFs Could Shine for Long-Term Investors]