GREENWICH, CT -- Interactive Brokers Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: IBKR), an automated global electronic broker and market maker, today announced plans to offer NextSharesTM exchange-traded managed funds (NextShares) to retail investors and financial professionals through its investing and trading platforms.
NextShares are a new way to invest in actively managed strategies. Because they are actively managed, NextShares offer the potential for benchmark-beating returns by applying their manager's proprietary investment research. Because they trade on an exchange, NextShares may offer cost and tax efficiencies that can enhance shareholder returns. NextShares were developed by NextShares Solutions LLC, an affiliate of Eaton Vance Corp. (Eaton Vance), and are expected to be offered by a range of well-known asset managers and across fund asset classes. The first NextShares funds began trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market LLC earlier this year.
"Offering high-quality services at a lower cost and providing our customers with compelling investment opportunities are integral features of our vision," said Thomas Peterffy, Chairman, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Interactive Brokers Group, Inc. "NextShares support this vision and can help investors meet their long-term investment goals."
"The potential performance and tax advantages of NextShares and the advanced trading technology and customer focus of Interactive Brokers are a powerful combination," said Stephen W. Clarke, President of NextShares Solutions. "NextShares on the Interactive Brokers platform should be a highly competitive alternative to mutual funds offered on fund supermarkets. We are proud to work together to provide greater access to NextShares."
The NextShares structure is broadly applicable across all asset classes in which mutual funds invest. Eaton Vance launched an initial three NextShares funds in the first quarter of this year and expects to introduce additional funds later this year. Ivy Investments (Ivy) has announced plans to launch its first three NextShares funds by late summer. Including Eaton Vance and Ivy, a dozen fund sponsors have indicated their intent to offer NextShares funds by filing exemptive applications with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and entering into preliminary agreements with NextShares Solutions.
About Interactive Brokers Group, Inc.
Interactive Brokers Group, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, is an automated global electronic broker that specializes in catering to financial professionals by offering state-of-the-art trading technology, superior execution capabilities, worldwide electronic access, and sophisticated risk management tools at exceptionally low costs. The brokerage trading platform utilizes the same innovative technology as the Company's market making business, which specializes in routing orders and executing and processing trades in securities, futures, foreign exchange instruments, bonds and funds on more than 100 electronic exchanges and trading venues around the world. As a market maker, we provide liquidity at these marketplaces and, as a broker, we provide professional traders and investors with electronic access to stocks, options, futures, forex, bonds and mutual funds from a single IB Universal Account™. Employing proprietary software on a global communications network, Interactive Brokers is continuously integrating its software with a growing number of exchanges and trading venues into one automatically functioning, computerized platform that requires minimal human intervention.