These low-free vehicles have boomed on the back of a decade-long bull market in equities.

Exchange-traded funds and products listed globally hit a record high of $5.4 trillion in assets, as improved market conditions cheered investors and encouraged more money to flow in, industry figures showed.

ETPs and ETFs gathered net inflows of $37.48 billion in March, bringing year-to-date net inflows to $99.14 billion. Assets invested rose by 1.42 per cent from the end of February, according to data from ETFGI, a research firm tracking this sector.

While figures were hit late last year as equities fell, in general these low-fee, index-tracking funds and products have boomed over the past decade. Rising stock markets, fuelled by central bank money printing and a move from more expensive, “active” ways of running money have encouraged the shift. Regulatory costs and changing ways of paying for advice have also prompted wealth managers to build portfolios from ETFs and products rather than more expensive funds. The shift has put pressure on asset managers’ fees.

ETFs are typically open-ended, index-based funds. ETPs, on the other hand, are similar to ETFs in the way they trade and settle but do not use an open-end fund structure.

“Markets appear to have returned to the relative calm they had grown accustomed to over the past few years. Returns for developed indices decelerated in March, as the effects of more cautious and accommodative central bank policies lose steam,” Deborah Fuhr, managing partner and founder of ETFGI, said.

At the end of March 2019, the global ETF/ETP industry had 7,720 ETFs/ETPs, from 412 providers listed on 72 exchanges in 58 countries.