Investors poured their money into fixed income exchange traded funds last month as the asset class gathered $13.6bn worth of inflows, according to London-based consultant ETFGI. 

Data from its global ETF and ETP industry insights report, which looks at data from the global ETF and exchange traded product industry, reported that global assets under management grew to over $2.8tn in February.

Deborah Fuhr, Managing Partner at ETFGI.

According to the data, inflows were led by fixed income last month, followed by commodity ETPs (which includes ETFs) which saw flows of $8.9bn. However, both figures were offset by net outflows from equity ETPs of $12.9bn.

Commodity ETPs have experienced a strong uptick in demand year-to-date (to 1 March 2016), gathering $12.2bn. The net inflows of $8.9bn into commodity ETPs during February 2016 surpassed the previous monthly record for the asset class of $6.7bn gathered in September 2012.

Similarly, since the start of the year, the Asia Pacific region has also seen record levels of net new assets with Asia Pacific ex Japan attracting net inflows of $6.4bn, while Japan-listed ETPs brought in $9.2bn in net new assets.

Leveraged and Inverse ETPs have also been in demand this year with net inflows of $5.6bn and $1.4bn, respectively.

Deborah Fuhr, managing partner at ETFGI, commented: “February was another volatile month for equity markets which drove investors to invest net flows into government bonds and gold.   The S&P 500 closed the month down 0.13%. Despite recent uncertainty, emerging markets gain 0.31% in February, while developed markets outside of the U.S. declined 1%.”

Vanguard has been the most successful gatherer of new assets so far this year, recording $4.2bn in net inflows during February and $8.1bn YTD. Nomura AM came in second place, having benefited from the surge in demand for ETFs in the Asia Pacific region. The provider gathered $1.5bn in net new assets during February and $5.7bn since the start of the year. iShares had a relatively successful February, netting $3.1bn in new assets. The world’s largest provider of ETFs has gathered $3.6bn in net new assets YTD.

S&P Dow Jones has the largest amount of ETP assets tracking its benchmarks reflecting 27.3% market share; MSCI is second with 14.3% market share, followed by FTSE Russell with a 12.3% market share.

As of 1 March2016, the global ETP industry has 6,200 ETPs, across 11,963 listings, from 279 providers listed on 64 exchanges in 51 countries.