Bedlam Asset Management is worried about ETFs. Our colleagues on FT Alphaville have already noted their concerns so I won’t go into detail. Suffice to say that Bedlam thinks parallels can be drawn between the evolution of ETFs from simple low cost product to complex sophisticated product with hidden costs and the expansion of securitisation that eventually led to the sub prime debacle.
Bedlam is an active manager so doesn’t use ETFs. But the possibility of a fraudulent operation being discovered and causing a run on gold, for example, as people sell out in a panic would have wide repurcussions. So it is alerting the market to this possibility.
