Lion Global Investors and Phillip Capital Management, two Singapore-based asset managers, have teamed up to launch the first ETF to focus entirely on Singapore real estate investment trusts (REITs). The Lion-Phillip S-REIT ETF will trade on the Singapore Exchange and will track the Morningstar Singapore REIT Yield Focus Index.

Northern Trust Asset Management has launched a unique sustainable real estate index tracking the performance of developed market real estate investment trusts (REITs) with strong responsible investment characteristics. According to GRESB, property ESG analyst and co-creator of the index, the global property sector is at the heart of the most important and far-reaching issues of our time, including urbanization, demographic change, resource constraints, environmental impacts and emerging technologies.

By Jesper Koll, Head of Japan for WisdomTree: “Japanese equities have been made great again by the Trump victory – they have outperformed most global markets since 8 November, with TOPIX up 7.2% against the 3% rise in the S&P 500, as of 29 November 2016. We believe that, Japan’s recent performance is not just a one-off adjustment but does have the potential to develop into a broad-based rally throughout the next 12-18 months. In coming weeks, any consolidation after the recent strong rally offers a great opportunity to reconsider a sizeable Japan allocation to capture positive momentum for dollar investors.”

European digital investment manager Scalable Capital has entered the UK market, opening its portfolio management business with portfolios constructed exclusively from exchange-traded funds. The move into the UK marks a key step in the firm’s ambitions to expand throughout Europe, having already established operations in Germany and Austria. The firm is the latest “robo-advisor” to enter the UK market. “The UK launch is a key milestone as we look to continue the strong growth of our business across Europe,” commented Adam French, Managing Director and co-Founder at Scalable Capital. “We are already one of the fastest growing digital investment managers in Europe and currently manage more than 1,200 client portfolios.”

Investment houses Standard Life, Aviva and M&G have frozen trading in their UK Real Estate funds following a rapid increase in redemption requests as a result of the Brexit vote. The move, which prevents investors withdrawing their money from the funds as managers seek to sell off parts of the portfolio to accommodate the backlog of redemption requests, serves to highlight the relative liquidity benefits of ETFs. The freezing of the two funds precipitated the Bank of England to state it was monitoring the behaviour of investors in open-ended commercial property funds, as one of the risks to financial stability in the UK.

Following the recent launch of its S&P Real Assets Index, S&P Dow Jones has issued a report examining the potential benefits of allocating to real assets. The report, entitled “Let’s Get Real About Indexing Real Assets” and authored by Jodie Gunzberg, Global Head of Commodities & Real Assets at S&P Dow Jones, highlights how real assets offer an effective means of reducing risk, enhancing diversification and achieving inflation protection. Unveiled on 31 December 2015, the S&P Real Assets Index measures the performance of real assets including global property, infrastructure, commodities, and inflation-linked bonds by using liquid and investable component indices that track public equities, fixed income, and futures. By using liquid and investable component indices, the index is suitable for use as an underlying reference for exchange-traded funds.

SGX Index Edge, the newly launched index division of the Singapore Stock Exchange (SGX), has introduced 11 new equity indices targeting sector-specific exposure within the Singapore economy. The new additions are part of SGX’s Thematic Indices, a project aimed at increasing transparency in the Asia-Pacific region, and the building blocks for investable products such as exchange-traded funds.

FlexShares, the exchange-traded fund arm of Northern Trust, has unveiled their latest fund offering, the FlexShares Real Asset Allocation Index Fund (Nasdaq: ASET). The ETF invests in three FlexShares ETFs that together provide exposure to equities focused on real assets: infrastructure, real estate and natural resources. Real assets have historically provided investors with an inflation hedge while also supplying a regular income stream especially through exposure to real estate investment trusts.

First Trust Advisors, a leading provider of exchange-traded funds, has launched an actively managed ETF which aims to provide investors with targeted exposure to US and international real estate securities. The First Trust Heitman Global Prime Real Estate ETF will invest in the shares of publicly-traded companies that own top tier, prime properties in the world’s dominant cities. “This ETF provides a unique tool for investors to gain exposure to an actively managed portfolio of some of the most attractive prime real estate assets around the world, in a way that’s both diversified and liquid,” said Ryan Issakainen, CFA, Senior Vice President, Exchange-Traded Fund Strategist at First Trust.

WisdomTree has rolled out three new ETFs targeting equity exposure outside the US. The WisdomTree Europe Local Recovery Fund (EZR) invests in European companies which derive more than 50% of their revenue from European customers. The WisdomTree Strong Dollar Emerging Markets Equity Fund (EMSD) is designed to provide exposure to emerging market companies that would benefit from a strengthening dollar. The WisdomTree Global ex-US Hedged Real Estate Fund (HDRW) offers investors the opportunity to participate in the high dividend paying profiles of real estate companies based outside the US, while mitigating exposure to currency movements against the US dollar.