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iShares, the world's largest family of Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) is the brand name of the exchange-traded fund family pioneered by Barclays Global Investors. Each iShare fund tracks a bond or stock market index.
Unlike US iShares, Barclay's added currency hedging features to the Canadian iShares, to distinguish them from the US products in response to the elimination of limits on foreign holdings by Canadians in an RRSP. The Canadian iShares for the S&P 500 index and the MSCI EAFE index are currency hedged such that changes in the Canadian/US exchange rate are not reflected in the value of the XSP and XIN Canadian iShares.
In the US, Harold Evensky, a CFP(R) and Financial editor/author in Coral Gables, wrote financial articles using iShares and ETFs as interchangeable terms starting in 2003. This linking was used by Barclays Global Investors in their late 2005 advertising campaign to personal advisors by having established financial planners like Deena Katz CFP(R) promoting iShares over a generic ETF term. In Canada iShares used to be known as iUnits. Barclay's re-branded all Canadian iUnits funds as iShares in April 2006.
Barclay's have the largest portfolio. This adds a level of comfort over other providers. The ETFs from Barclays are generally the most liquid. Although ETFs are not sold at much of a premium or discount because of arbitrage, it still can help a little when buying and selling if there are a lot of shares available for trading. Barclays' ETFs are passively managed. That is, they holdings within the ETF track an index.
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