After seven years in the ETF business, a big, publicly traded mutual fund firm has crossed into 11-figures territory in the ETF space.

Jennifer M. "Jenny" Johnson Franklin Resources, Inc. President, CEO

The team at Franklin Resources (dba Franklin Templeton [profile]) confirmed last week that their ETF business have crossed the $10-billion AUM mark as of August 12 (less than two weeks after Franklin closed on its planned purchase of Legg Mason, another publicly traded, active asset management giant). San Mateo, California-based Franklin now offers 91 ETFs worldwide, a company spokesperson confirms.

The Franklin team introduced their first ETF in November 2013. In 2016, they expanded the effort substantially, launching their LibertyShares (first with strategic beta LibertyQ ETFs and then with a new suite of active ETFs. In 2017, they added their first traditional (i.e. market-cap weighted) passive ETFs. Meanwhile, the Legg deal ties Franklin in to the translucent (more commonly called ANT, i.e. active non-transparent) ETF space, as Legg had been in the process of buying a majority stake in one of that space's pioneers, Precidian Investments. 

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