AssetCo-owned River Global will make its long-awaited European ETF debut as part of an initiative to tap new investor audiences, ETF Stream can reveal.
The firm’s plans to launch ETFs were first announced prior to River and Mercantile rebranding to River Global and as part of AssetCo’s sale of thematic specialist Rize ETF to Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest in September 2023.
The acquisition notice revealed AssetCo and ARK would partner on “several” River and Mercantile ETFs on the ARK Invest Europe platform. However, the firm is yet to launch its maiden ETF.
In a statement, a River Global spokesperson told ETF Stream: “In recent months we have been working on ways to bring our successful and strong performing investment strategies to a wider customer base, including via ETFs.
“They will be brought to market when development is complete.”
Although no timescale was offered for River Global’s ETF entry, the update coincides with AssetCo seeking to restructure its business to split platform and discretionary fund manager (DFM) Parmenion from River Global, a conglomerate of active fund management houses.
This follows a drive to offload structurally loss-making ventures, with AssetCo’s full-year results published last March revealing a statutory loss of £26m – £2.6m of which was attributable to Rize ETF.
AssetCo acquired a 63% stake in the ETF issuer in July 2021 for £16.5m. It then wrote down the value of Rize ETF by roughly £5m in June 2023 after stating the business was “materially behind plan”.
Despite previously struggling to compete with more established ETF promoters, AssetCo executive chair Martin Gilbert (pictured) was optimistic about collaborating with ARK to re-enter the market.
“ARK is a committed and highly successful ETF player based in the US and we are extremely pleased to have reached an agreement that maintains our interest in the growth of their business for a period and also to partner with them to launch our own ETF products, managed by River and Mercantile Asset Management,” Gilbert said previously.
ARK launched three of its popular US-listed active thematic strategies in Europe last April, with the UCITS ETF trio collectively amassing $90m of assets under management to-date.
ARK’s Europe sales head James Thomas departed in December to rejoin State Street Global Advisors (SSGA).