Here are some recent developments in and around the world of exchange traded funds.

A number of exchange traded funds have been launched, or developments around them have taken place, in recent days.

First Trust
First Trust Advisors, has rolled out an actively managed ETF, the First Trust Institutional Preferred Securities and Income ETF. The fund seeks total return and current income by investing at least 80 per cent of its assets in institutional preferred securities and income-producing debt securities. The fund is sub-advised by Stonebridge Advisors.

The new fund, FPEI, will be a pure play on the institutional preferred securities market, which is not easily accessible to retail investors and that we believe offers great value in the current market environment from both an income and relative value standpoint,” Robert Wolf, senior portfolio manager at Stonebridge, said. 

In early August, First Trust's First Trust Global Portfolios business launched what it says is the first actively managed foreign exchange ETF in Europe, designed to appeal to investors anxious to manage forex risks and earn returns in a low-yield world. The First Trust FactorFX UCITS ETF, which is available on the London Stock Exchange, will hold a basket of between 20 to 30 currency pairs in developing and emerging markets through forward FX contracts, futures, money market instruments and short-dated sovereign debt. The Irish-domiciled UCITS ETF is denominated in US dollars and has a total expense ratio of 0.75 per cent. (The fund isn't based on some sort of index, as is the case with many ETFs; ETFs are units traded on exchanges by market makers. Units are created by authorised participants.)

Redwood
Redwood Asset Management offered an exchange offering for the ETF units of the Redwood Canadian Preferred Share Fund. Investors have until September 15 to tender their preferred shares and other accepted securities in exchange for units of the fund. The offering, which closes on September 22, is the first of its kind in Canada, the firm said. The fund trades under the ticker symbol RPS on the NEO Exchange.

The investment objective of the fund is principally to provide a consistent stream of income with potential for capital appreciation by investing in Canadian income producing securities and Canadian equities.