London Stock Exchange - New ETF Listings 2019

A Transformative Year for the London Stock Exchange: 2019 New ETF Listings

The exchange-traded fund (ETF) landscape on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) experienced significant diversification and sophisticated thematic expansion throughout 2019. Coming off the back of a volatile 2018—a year marked heavily by geopolitical friction, including the U.S. withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal which reinstated severe economic sanctions, crippled Iran’s economy, and sent ripple effects across global energy markets—issuers in 2019 shifted their focus toward long-term structural tailwinds, robust environmental criteria, and multi-currency cost efficiency.

Pioneering Issuers and Broad Strategic Product Offerings

The year saw major global financial powerhouses aggressively expand or formalize their product lines on the LSE. Notably, Goldman Sachs made waves by listing its "ActiveBeta" factor-based strategies alongside core emerging market debt exposures. JPMorgan ETF also heavily expanded its footprint, rolling out an extensive "BetaBuilders" suite covering US equities and sovereign bonds, while offering ultra-short duration income solutions tailored to both USD and GBP investors.

Furthermore, Amundi ETF introduced its hyper-low-cost "Prime" series, disrupting the core market by introducing fixed income and equity options carrying total expense ratios (TER) as low as 5 basis points (bps).

Prominent Investment Themes and Asset Classes

The listings of 2019 highlighted a profound shift in consumer and investor demand, moving standard equity or fixed-income portfolios into highly targeted strategic pillars:

• The ESG and Climate Revolution: Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) criteria transitioned from a niche preference to an absolute market standard. Issuers like iShares, Amundi, and UBS listed a massive array of Paris-Aligned Benchmarks (PAB) and ESG-enhanced equity and corporate bond products.
• Green Bonds: Fixed-income strategies evolved to match climate goals, notably highlighted by the Amundi Global Aggregate Green Bond UCITS ETF and the Franklin Liberty Euro Green Bond ETF.
• Geographic Evolution & Targeted Sovereigns: Investors gained hyper-specific country tools, such as the Invesco MSCI Kuwait UCITS ETF, alongside a fresh roster of low-cost single-country emerging market products covering India, Brazil, and Korea from Franklin Templeton.

Cutting-Edge Product Innovation

Beyond broad-market criteria, 2019 was a milestone year for novel mega-trends and specialized structural themes wrapped in an ETF format. Rather than buying broad technology sectors, issuers launched highly granular sub-sector concepts:

• Disruptive Technology & Megatrends: HANetf and L&G ETFs broke new ground with the introduction of targeted thematic products like the L&G Artificial Intelligence UCITS ETF and the WisdomTree Cloud Computing UCITS ETF.
• Future Mobility & Entertainment: Structural societal shifts were captured through products targeting next-generation infrastructure, including the iShares Electric Vehicles and Driving Technology UCITS ETF and the VanEck Vectors Video Gaming and eSports UCITS ETF.
• Digital Tangibles: Invesco captured early institutional appetite for decentralized infrastructure by listing the Invesco CoinShares Global Blockchain UCITS ETF.
• Essential Sustainability: Pure-play resource sustainability came to the forefront with vehicles like the L&G Clean Water UCITS ETF.

Summary of Notable Structural Launches

The diverse landscape can be framed by looking at the varying expense structures and currency flexibility across these new concepts:

The 2019 listings clearly illustrated an evolving market where systemic geopolitical risk was met with highly targeted, liquid, and innovative risk-management toolkits.