An unlikely superstar is emerging in the battle for ETF supremacy: the professor.
It’s easy to see why. With the three largest ETF issuers controlling 83% of the assets, others must go above and beyond to stand out. That means pioneering higher IQ products, like smart-beta, which shun traditional indexes in favor of weighting by other factors. It also means innovating wherever possible, setting an attractive price, coming up with a memorable ticker — and now, getting backing from an array of big thinkers.
“Academics always bring credibility to the table,” said Rusty Vanneman, chief investment officer at CLS Investments, which manages $9 billion from Omaha, Neb. “They have always been important but probably even more so in recent years.”