Industry Updates

BlackRock closes several Hong Kong and Australia ETFs

David Tuckwell

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BlackRock is closing several ETFs listed in Hong Kong and Australia, as part of its sweep of the broom heading into the new year. The closed ETFs are:

Hong Kong

  • iShares FTSE 100 Index ETF (2847, 82847)

  • iShares DAX Index ETF (3146, 83146)

  • iShares Euro Stoxx 50 Index ETF (3155, 83155)

Australia

  • iShares MSCI Taiwan ETF/AU (ITW)

In each case, the shuttered funds did not attract enough assets to become profitable. ETFs are often closed or restructured when they fail to entice investors. Almost every major ETF provider around the world has closed at least one ETF.

The Australia-based Taiwan ETF (ITW) was listed in 2007 by Barclays – which at the time owned iShares.

After 12 years ITW has only accumulated $6 million. The fund was utterly dominated by Taiwan Semiconductor, the world’s largest semiconductor manufacturer and Taiwan’s largest company by far, which hogged more than 25% of the fund.

Over the past two years, BlackRock has nipped and tucked iShares’ Aussie ETF suite. It has closed other Barclays-era single country ETFs, including its Hong Kong and Singapore trackers. While other Barclays-era ETFs have been remade with improvements.

The Hong Kong closures bring the total number of iShares’ Hong Kong-listed ETF down to 10. iShares Hong Kong mostly offers low-cost core Asia and China-focussed ETFs.

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