ETF Inflows Slow, but Barclays Benefits

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- The ETF industry added more assets in August, but the pace of net inflows slowed from almost $13.5 billion in July to a little more than $5.5 billion.

Barclays grabbed a huge slice of the pie, with $2.2 billion in inflows, followed by $2.1 billion at Vanguard; Invesco/PowerShares and SSgA added about $1 billion each; and Direxion claimed $0.5 billion. Those numbers were mainly offset by outflows of $1.6 billion at ProShares.

The funds with the largest inflows were iShares S&P 500(IVV Quote), $1 billion; iShares Russell 2000(IWM Quote), $700 million; iShares Barclays TIPS(TIP Quote), $600 million; Vanguard REIT(VNQ Quote), $500 million; and SPDR S&P Energy(XLE Quote), $400 million.

The funds with the largest outflows were iShares FTSE/Xinhua China 25(FXI Quote), $1.6 billion; iShares MSCI Emerging Markets(EEM Quote), $1 billion; ProShares Ultra Dow Jones Financials(UYG Quote), $500 million; ProShares Ultra S&P 500(SSO Quote), $500 million; and SPDR S&P 500(SPY Quote), $500 million.

As we saw in previous months, some of the shift in assets was between funds using very similar, if not the same, strategies. This month, funds flowed out of SPY and into IVV. While EEM lost assets, Vanguard MSCI Emerging Markets (VWO) added $200 million.

Some of the fastest-growing ETFs (inflows relative to assets) were bearish funds. Direxion Daily Small Cap Bear 3X(TZA Quote), which saw $381 million flow into the fund. That was more than the final assets at the end of the month, however, as rising markets ate into returns.

ETF Securities Silver(SIVR Quote) added $93 million in assets on top of the $4 million in July. ProShares UltraShort Silver(ZSL Quote) and ProShares UltraPro Short S&P 500(SPXU Quote) saw rapid growth in assets as well.

Finally, PowerShares DB U.S. Dollar Bullish(UUP Quote) saw inflows of $173 million, bringing assets to $354 million -- still less than 50% of year ago August assets.