Across BlackRock’s four largest exchange-traded funds, the manager’s MSCI EAFE tracking ETF has experienced two days so far in 2018 of outsized trading volume. Daily volumes across iShares four largest core ETFs, which make up about 23% of its total U.S. ETF business by assets, have seen an uptick relative to their 2017 averages. The most active days for the EAFE and emerging markets varieties have already surpassed their most active days in 2017. Tuesday’s session saw about 58 million shares of the Core MSCI EAFE ETF change hands, below the recorded 95.7 million shares traded on Jan. 30 but still well ahead of 2018’s and 2017’s daily averages.
Bloomberg reported that the accelerated activity in the Core EAFE strategy earlier this week came in the form of a large block trade at the expense of several country-focused strategies.
The Core S&P 500 and aggregate bond ETFs have seen more pedestrian volume levels aside from the high volatility period in late January and early February.
