ETF Inflows & Outflows
Performance Leaders & Laggards
Source: ETF Action; flows and performance data as of 5/21/26; performance data excludes leveraged and inverse products
Weekly ETF Reads
Investors Are Flocking to This ETF, But Its Holdings Look Overvalued by Jeffrey Ptak
“The Roundhill Memory ETF has been a smashing success so far, growing faster than virtually any other fund in history at this stage of its life.”
(Note: Roundhill CEO Dave Mazza joined me for a special edition of ETF Prime to discuss the record growth of the Roundhill Memory ETF and share his perspective on the valuations of its underlying holdings. You can watch the conversation below.)
Mixing ETF Fund Families Can Be Hazardous To Your Performance by Garth Friesen
“Pair IDEV with VWO, and there will be no exposure to South Korea; Pair VEA with IEMG, and exposure is doubled, holding South Korea in both the developed and emerging markets ETFs.”
Largest asset managers escalate ETF competition as market floods with products by Ari I. Weinberg
“No product is safe from being poached. Issuers must ramp up efforts to improve their lineups and maintain market share.”
How Active ETFs Are Reshaping Fund Fees by Zachary Evens
“It’s difficult to find success in ETFs, but finding success in relatively expensive ETFs can mean serious windfalls for their sponsors.”
How ETF Issuers Are Expanding Outside the US by Lilly Riddle
“When you get a successful product in the US, people start knocking on the door in Sweden or Mexico or wherever.”
Why the ETF Ecosystem Is Changing Faster Than Most Realize by Nicholas Phillips
“Today, the growth of outsourced ETF services is creating more pathways for those ideas to reach investors.”
How Weird Are ETFs Getting? Try UFO and Midnight-Bitcoin Funds by Jason Zweig
“As product proliferation occurs in the edgier parts of the market, it’s incumbent on investors to do more homework.”
Space ETFs booming in anticipation of SpaceX IPO by Suzanne McGee
“Space-related ETFs have attracted $1.3 billion in new cash in the last month alone.”
Why Trump’s bitcoin ETF plans likely collapsed before getting off the ground by Helene Braun
“I mean do we really need a 14th spot bitcoin ETF?”
Hyperliquid ETFs draw $22.3 million in early inflows, analysts point to ‘good sign of organic interest’ by Kyle Baird
“The network has captured more than 42% of all blockchain fees this week, ahead of Ethereum’s and Solana’s respective 8% and 11% shares.”
ETF Post of the Week
SEC Chairman Paul Atkins put up a yield sign on prediction market ETFs this past week, signaling that the agency will seek public comment before charting a path forward. Issuers including Bitwise, GraniteShares, and Roundhill hope to package event contracts into ETFs, allowing investors to wager on outcomes ranging from elections to economic data releases. As I recently noted to CNBC, even under a more lenient SEC, the agency is not simply greenlighting every ETF filing that crosses its desk – and that’s a good thing.
Exchange-traded funds have been—and remain—a major driver of innovation in the securities markets. ETFs have contributed to increased capital formation and investor choice, reflected in part by the tripling of ETF assets since 2019.
— Paul Atkins (@SECPaulSAtkins) May 21, 2026
Novel products raise novel questions, and I…
ETF Chart of the Week
Spot hyperliquid ETFs have been an early hit, with the recently launched 21Shares Hyperliquid ETF (THYP) and Bitwise Hyperliquid ETF (BYHP) seeing trading volumes surge and attracting a combined $80 million in less than two weeks. Assets in the two products are now approaching $100 million, boosted by HYPE’s nearly 40% gain since THYP launched on May 11th.
Source: The Block
ETF Prime Podcast
Last week’s ETF Prime featured Todd Rosenbluth, Head of Research at VettaFi, and Andrew Beer, Managing Member of DBi. Todd talked ETF flows, new launches (nice recap here), industry milestones, and other key trends shaping the ETF landscape. Andrew provided a primer on managed futures strategies and highlighted the iMGP DBi Managed Futures Strategy ETF (DBMF) and the Simplify DBi CTA Managed Futures Index ETF (SDMF).
ETF Prime Podcast: Special Edition!
Dave Mazza, CEO of Roundhill Investments, joined me for a special edition of ETF Prime to go inside the launch and rapid growth of DRAM, the fastest ETF to reach $10 billion in assets.
Crypto Prime Podcast
Amy Oldenburg, Head of Digital Asset Strategy at Morgan Stanley, joined me on last week’s Crypto Prime to discuss how the firm is expanding its digital asset strategy through spot crypto ETFs, direct crypto trading, and tokenization initiatives.
