“While we applaud those platforms which now offer ETFs to their clients, ETFs are still not universally available across all platforms,” he said.
iShares has been working with a number of investment platforms to help dvelop their infrastructure to enable them to offer ETFs to clients.
“This is something we will continue to champion as platforms fundamentally need to adapt with the times and upgrade their infrastructure; otherwise they will eventually lose all ability to compete in a changing world,” Mr Parkin says.
He believes investors wanting to use ETFs to better manage their portfolios are being held back by the inability of investment platforms to easily buy and sell ETFs.
He points out that retail investors have only been able to buy whole shares in a single company stock or ETF on platforms and this has often left a proportion of cash un-invested. But this, he said, is changing.
He gives the example of an investor having £100 to invest but the value of a share is £53, so this would leave them with £47 un-invested.
“However this been revolutionised with the launch fractional shares, which allows investors to buy a fraction of an ETF unit costing as little as one penny,” Mr Parkin says.
In the example above, fractional shares would mean that the remaining £47 could be invested.
“This ultimately means an investor is more likely to reach their investment goals quicker,” Mr Parkin says, though he adds this is yet to be widely adopted across the industry.
“We are working with third parties and platforms to make this widely available.”
laura.miller@ft.com
