The next 10 years in ETF growth could be dominated by this asset class

If there is any one investment product that has experienced a true boom over the last 10 years, it is exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and exchange-traded products (ETPs) more broadly.  The number of listed products has increased by 17.5 times in Australia during the last decade alone. More than 300 products are now listed across the ASX and CBOE exchanges and two million Australians have at least one ETF in their portfolio. And, as if you need more proof of the growth of ETPs, 2024 marked the first time that inflows outpaced those going into unlisted managed funds.  So if we've seen this growth over the last decade, what could the next 10 years hold? In this episode of The Rules of Investing, we put this and other questions to Tamara Haban-Beer Stats, Director and ETF/Index Investments Specialist at BlackRock Australia. BlackRock is the world's largest asset manager and its ETF arm iShares runs 49 ETPs in the Australian market. In this episode, Tamara also discusses the key mega forces that BlackRock believes could drive markets over the long run, where they are overweight in portfolios and the asset classes they believe could see the biggest growth within ETPs over the coming years. Note: This episode was recorded on Tuesday 19 March 2024. Timestamps 0:00 - Intro 2:21 - BlackRock's outlook for the next 12 months 4:06 - What the new investing regime means for ETF investors 6:17 - The five "mega forces" of investing  9:13 - Currency impacts on ETF returns 10:27 - Will the Australian Dollar rebound in late 2024? 13:45 - Should investors consider hedged ETFs? 14:55 - Opportunities in Japan and the US 16:47 - Why the AI boom won't be early 2000 all over again 18:02 - The explosion of interest and uptake in ETFs 21:31 - The asset class that could gain the lion's share of growth in the future 23:17 - Other interesting innovations in the global ETF market 25:06 - Which products are seeing the most inflows and outflows in 2024? 27:31 - The Rules of Investing's regular questions (with an ETF twist)