BlackRock's iShares unit is the latest ETF provider to join the price wars as its vies to keep up with its rivals like Vanguard, State Street and Charles Schwab.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Competition among ETF providers has intensified, forcing many to cut expense ratios as they race to snatch up the growing number of investors who are trading in their mutual funds for the cheaper and more tax-friendly investment.
In fact, many expense ratios -- the percentage based on assets under management that money management firms charge investors annually for owning their ETFs -- are down to just pennies.
Beginning Wednesday, BlackRock is charging just 0.07%, or 70 cents for every $1,000 invested, for owning its iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (IVV), which previously charged 0.09%, as well as its iShares Core S&P Total U.S. Stock Market ETF (ISI), which previously charged a lofty 0.20%.
BlackRock's bold price reductions come as its iShares unit vies to keep up with its rivals. Though iShares remains the world's largest ETF provider, it has been steadily losing market share in recent years, likely due to high costs, according to Morningstar. In fact, iShares accounts for about 40% of all ETF assets now, down from almost 50% in 2009.
Related: Individual investors have insatiable appetite for ETFs
Meanwhile, Vanguard, the third-largest player in the ETF market and the long-standing leader of low-cost ETFs, has been gaining traction. The firm's market share has climbed to a healthy 20% from 11% three years ago.
"There's definitely some tension in the industry," said Todd Rosenbluth, ETF analyst with S&P Capital IQ. "Investors are moving out of mutual funds, and while some of their money is staying on the sidelines, some of it is making its way into ETFs. So the ETF pie keeps growing, and the providers are doing what they can to increase their share."
While part of their strategy is to create new ETFs -- about 150 new ETFs have come on line so far this year -- issuers are also having to go head-to-head on pricing.
"The ETF industry isn't quite mature yet, but it's jumped out of the sandbox and has made it onto to the swing sets," said Tom Lydon, president of Global Trends Investments and editor of the ETF Trends website. "There are multiple companies with products that track the same index or a very similar one, and when you're looking at those ETFs, you're naturally looking at the expense."
Related: ETFs: Why so complicated?
Even smaller players are getting in on the fee war in an attempt to win over investors.
Last month, Charles Schwab, which owns less than 1% of the $1.3 trillion of overall ETFs, undercut Vanguard by slashing its fees between 15% and 60% on 15 ETFs. For example, it will charge just 0.04% for the Schwab U.S. Broad Market ETF (SCHB), down from 0.8%. By comparison, the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO) currently charges 0.05%.
But Vanguard fired back quickly. Earlier this month, the firm said it was switching the underlying index for 22 ETFs in favor of ones that boast lower licensing fees. The move won't take effect until January, but will enable Vanguard to deliver even lower expense ratios to its ETF shareholders over time.
"This is clearly a positive trend for investors," said David Kotok, chief investment officer at Cumberland Advisors, which exclusively uses ETFs in its stock portfolios. "We always look at expense ratios when distinguishing between ETFs, and this price compression has been a long time coming."
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Plus, it's not about to end, said Christian Magoon, CEO of Magoon Capital and an ETF industry consultant.
"These decisions tend to have a ripple effect across the marketplace," he said. "So far, we've seen the costs come down on the products that have a bulk of the assets. In the next wave, we should see expense ratios come down on products that are priced at a premium relative to the larger ETF."
And even further down the line, Magoon said there could be some ETFs with a 0% expense ratio. Rather than charging a fee to simply own the ETF, issuers could lure in investors with no-cost products and earn revenue by providing other services, he said.
But experts stress that fees like the expense ratio are not the only factors to consider when it comes to the total cost of owning an ETF.
Most importantly, investors need to consider the bid-to-ask spread. Since ETFs trade on exchanges, just like individual stocks, the spread is the difference between the highest and lowest prices that buyers are willing to pay and what sellers are asking for. Higher spreads add to the transaction costs, so investors should be looking for narrower spreads, which are typically characteristic for the most liquid products.
For example, even though the Schwab U.S. Broad Market ETF boasts the lowest expense ratio in the entire ETF industry, its average bid-to-ask spread makes its total cost more than that of the Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF, according to data analysis from Vanguard.
"Investors really need to focus on the overall ownership cost of and ETF," said Magoon. "But expense ratios are part of that overall cost, so this race to the bottom is a big plus."
First Published: October 17, 2012: 8:26 AM ET
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