Forbes – The fund industry sprouts exchange-traded products (ETPs) like weeds on a warm spring day. This makes it very hard to differentiate one from another. There needs to be better classification tools. Fund companies and index providers must step up their efforts to agree on standard definitions and educate investors about these differences.
As of year-end, there were 1361 ETPs, most of which most where exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and exchange-traded notes (ETNs). There are also 894 yet-to-be approved ETPs filed with the SEC, according to Heather Bell atIndexUniverse.com . This brings the total in circulation (or in some stage of filing) to over 2,200 products.
