ETF Securities to focus on expansion following acquisition by Mirae

By Penny Pryor

Mirae Asset Global Investments and its subsidiary Global X ETFs have acquired local exchange traded product outfit ETF Securities. But the organisation expects business to continue as usual with a renewed focus on building its presence, according to head of distribution, Kanish Chugh.

"I guess one thing that we are going to be focused on is expanding our footprint here in Australia, both within from a team perspective [and] product, and that's something that you're only going to see increasednews around what we're trying to do over the coming weeks and months," Chugh said.

The acquisition will provide ETF Securities substantial resources which it will be able to use to build its presence in the Australian market.

"We are incredibly excited to enter the Australian market and to meaningfully expand our global ETF footprint through the acquisition of ETF Securities' inventive business," chief executive officer of Mirae Asset Global Investments, Byungsung Lee, said when announcing the acquisition.

"This acquisition ... brings immediate scale to our operations in Australia."

Chugh said the next few months would be spent taking stock of potential synergies and working out what the next steps would be.

In terms of product trends, Chugh said that there had recently been a lot of interest in defensive asset classes like gold on the back of equity market volatility.

"As a provider we want to make sure we just provide solutions for investors to build portfolios. It's going to be across the spectrum, whether it's defensive, growth, different asset classes, crypto, that's how we see our, our service to investors in the market," Chugh said.