What to know about trading liquidity

Article Excerpt

High levels of trading between buyers and sellers of ETF units is normally enough to ensure that the bid-offer spreads remain small and that the market price of the units trade close to the value of the underlying assets. However, there is more to ETF liquidity. Secondary market trading—which happens on the stock exchanges between sellers and buyers of the existing ETF units—depends on how many ETF units have been issued and the interest of buyers and sellers in trading. Highly liquid ETFs normally have very low bid-offer spreads and high volumes of daily trading. Except for the most illiquid ETFs, most investors will readily get their orders filled. However, ETF managers, with the assistance of market makers, can also create or redeem ETF units for more sparsely traded funds in order to support secondary market trading. However, if an ETF invests in securities that have limited supply or are difficult to trade, the market makers’ ability to create or redeem those…