The fast-growing ETF market is a high potential sector in CACEIS’ business development strategy. In accordance with the objectives announced as part of our 2025 Medium-Term Plan (MTP), we will make the necessary investment to strengthen our ETF service offering and become a key partner for ETF industry players.
CACEIS has extensive experience in the ETF industry and is in an excellent position to share its recognised expertise with our global clientele. We rank among the top 3 ETF service providers in Europe, producing daily NAVs for more than 200 funds, which together represent over €100bn.
We are committed to continually enhancing our services to ensure clients have access to the most up-to-date and technologically advanced services on the market. Our experience and service range combine to make us a market-leading player that any ETF promoter should consider, whether they are launching new funds, rationalising their range, or thinking of consolidating their wider fund management activities with a single service provider.
“We see the ETF Industry continuing to be a key growth area for many years to come” states Dimitri Sakkis, Group Head of Operational Line - Fund Distribution Services & ETF Services at CACEIS. "For this reason, we launched an innovative ETF dealing platform called TEEPI ETF”.
Since the launch of TEEPI ETF in 2021, CACEIS has made further developments to the platform by adding new modules and upgrading its capabilities, including secure access for authorised participants (APs) to place orders on any fund that we administer. TEEPI ETF offers significant efficiency gains as APs can upload batched orders that fund issuers and APs can then track until each one is settled. The platform, which was launched at the end of 2021, is already used daily by a growing number of APs. In fact, our teams are very busy on-boarding many new investors and APs to the platform.
“We are making ongoing improvements that give the platform greater flexibility, and have launched a new multi-settlement feature, along with Switch order enhancements, and a facility which would permit fund issuers to fully-embed the TEEPI platform into their in-house systems and create direct links with third-party Transfer Agents” adds Gilles Dubos, Senior Expert – ETF Solutions at CACEIS.
CACEIS’ objective is not to force our clients to use TEEPI, rather it is to develop a set of tools that offers sufficient flexibility so that a prospective client with its own portal, can seamlessly integrate it with our IT systems. We fully understand that certain fund issuers prefer to maintain their technology platforms in-house, which is why this flexibility was a core concept in our design specifications. This is one of the greatest benefits of our “co-creation” technology development policy, where we undertake an extensive consultation phase with clients to ensure the end-product meets their requirements.
In terms of ETF-related services, CACEIS is adding new solutions to the current offering in order to be an efficient one-stop shop covering all of our clients’ needs. Gilles Dubos comments, “We are currently working on a new partnership for the production of the Portfolio Composition File (PCF), a key element in any ETF fund launch. Most of our existing clients were happy to handle this part of the process themselves. However, to remove any potential barriers to establishing a new client relationship, we wanted to make sure that we had a full solution at our disposal. Discussions with the provider are now at an advanced stage and we should be in a position to make an announcement on this new relationship in the near future.”
CACEIS’ entity in Ireland is currently working on an ETF launch for a new client that will leverage both the new partnership for PCF production and the TEEPI ETF AP portal. The same entity is also working on establishing the necessary structure for funds managed through the International Central Securities Depository (ICSD) model. The most common models are issuance through the ICSD, where a common depository needs to be appointed, and the ICSD+ model. Some issuers might also prefer the local CSD model depending on their target investors. As a group, we have been active on the local CSD and the ICSD+ but less so on the ICSD solution. Having a comprehensive list of solutions available to our clients is nevertheless key, and that should be the case for us before year-end.
The next big step for CACEIS is to enhance our technical capabilities on order types and we are actively working on a scalable solution for cash actual orders. Once in place, this will allow for each order to be allocated the exact cost of execution, which will improve the tracking performance of the fund and in return lead the Authorised Participants to reduce the spread they apply on the secondary market.
“All these developments have been designed to ensure we better meet our clients’ needs in terms of the range of services and the flexibility of the solutions. Across the ETF sector we have noted a growing trend for diversification through thematic funds such as those with an ESG focus. SFDR requires managers to classify their funds as either an Article 8 or 9 fund to ensure that institutional investors can continue to invest in line with the green economy”, says Gilles Dubos.
Entering the ETF market can be a daunting task due to the large and well-established incumbent players. However, with the advent of thematic ETFs and active ETFs, we believe there is a window of opportunity to penetrate the market and then build on initial success to become a substantial player. Active ETFs represent less than 1% of the European market at present and ETF experts within CACEIS believe that now is an ideal time to consider launching a product with an ETF wrapper.
“We accompany our clients throughout the entire product-structuring phase and provide our state-of-the-art TEEPI ETF platform so they can launch ETF products with minimal hassle and market them rapidly and easily to their investors. CACEIS is committed to being a long-term partner for our clients, and we explicitly state this objective in our 2025 Medium-Term Plan”, concludes Dimitri Sakkis.
