European ETF market is still well behind US. By the end of 2007 assets in European ETF bln vs US $581 bln. Nevertheless European assets grew by 43% last year. In terms of issues 423 vs 601. Even thought ETF is the fastest growing retail investment product ETF market makes up only 5% of mutual funds assets in US. In Europe the number is even smaller, around 2%.Equity based ETF are the most popular. In Europe it's about 80% of the market and in US 90%. Bonds are glamour ETF in Europe.Worldwide leading issuer is Barclays Global Investors (BSC), iShares. In US followed by State Street Global Advisors, Vanguard, Power Shares, ProShares and others. In Europe first position again for Barclays, then Lyxor and Deutsche Bank (DB) with rapidly growing db x-trackers.Ten top ETF...

The ETF market is looking crowded in terms of numbers and diversity of funds, and the number of ETF sponsors. However, the market shares are highly concentrated with a steep gradient of fund sizes and sponsor market shares.

As of April (according to score keeping by Vanguard) the top ETF sponsors by asset market share were:

#1 Barclays: 53.0% (iShares & iPathETNs) http://www.ishares.com http://www.ipathetn.com

#2 State Street: 24.8% share (SPDRs) http://www.ssgafunds.com

#3 Vanguard: 8.0% share (Vangurd) http://www.vanguard.com

#4 Invesco: 6.5% share (Power Shares) http://www.invescopowershares.com

#5 ProFunds: 2.8% share (ProShares) http://www.proshares.com

#6 Merrill Lynch: 1.1% share (Holders) http://www.holdrs.com

#7 Rydex: 1.0% share (Rydex Funds & Currency Shares) http://www.rydexfunds.com http://www.currencyshares.com

The top four sponsors have 92+% market share.  The top seven sponsors have 97+% share.  All the rest divide less than 3% between them.

Richard

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