Vontobel has listed its first open-end tracker certificate on bitcoin on the Swedish NGM Exchange, allowing investors to participate without buying and storing the coins digitally. The bank issued the first bitcoin tracker certificate in Switzerland and Germany as well as mini futures short, which enable investors to trade on a falling bitcoin price. The certificate has no end date and a yearly management fee of 1.5% pa. Starting on the launch day, January 16, investors will be able to trade the tracker on the secondary market. Vontobel was the first to launch an investment product on bitcoin in Switzerland, in July 2016,and in Germany, in November 2016. In 2017, both tracker certificates accounted for a total volume of more than CHF500m on the Swiss Exchange. Bitcoin was the second most traded instrument by turnover as well as by transactions in Germany.

UBS has launched the Insightshares LGBT Employment Equality ETF, the first in the series of exchange-traded funds issued under the brand. Created and offered by Exchange Traded Concepts, the investment is designed to track the performance of the UBS LGBT Employment Equality Index, which is provided by UBS and designed to track the shares of US companies that provide LGBT equality as measured by their score in the Human Rights Campaign Foundation's Corporate Equality Index.

Saxo Bank has launched the Essential account, a pricing solution for entry-level traders of OTC leverage products. The introduction responds to recent regulatory concerns around the amount of leverage available to retail clients trading OTC leverage products. The new account was initially launched in the UAE on January 8 and will be rolled out in the UK, Australia and Singapore during the first months of 2018. The account will offer access to four asset classes; foreign exchange, index contracts for difference, stocks and bonds. Clients will be able to access the company's full range of stocks and bonds, but only the most popular FX pairs and index CFDs with a minimum funding of €1,000. The new account also incorporates additional risk management functionality, with limited loss, limited leverage, in line with recent proposals from Esma.

Deutsche Asset Management has listed its first set of Ucits-compliant ETFs on the Mexican Stock Exchange. The 21 ETFs complement its existing index funds already available on the exchange, and are aimed at expanding the strategies available to local institutional investors and advisors.

The asset manager has also deployed three new US dollar Solactive indices tracked by ETFs of its family of high-yield corporate bond indices, trading on the NYSE: the High Yield Corporates Total Market 0-5 Year, the High Yield Corporates Total Market Low Beta, and High Yield Corporates Total Market High Beta Index.

China Post Global has listed the Market Access iStoxx Mutb Japan Quality 150 Index Ucits ETF on the London Stock Exchange. The ETF is also listed on Deutsche Börse and Six, but this is the first time the ETF provider has listed a product in London Stock Exchange since its acquisition of the Market Access range of ETFs from RBS.

Nasdaq Corporate Solutions has launched PassiveIQ, an analytics tool designed to provide investor relations professionals with insights into passive index investment data from mutual funds and ETFs. The solution is designed to benchmark passive ownership in a company's shares relative to its peers and is designed to appeal to all public companies, regardless of market capitalisation or location.

American Century Investments has launched Stoxx US Quality Value and Diversified Corporate Bond ETFs, its first two ETFs; both are listed on NYSE Arca. The US Quality Value ETF uses the company's Intelligent Beta methodology 'to dampen the cyclicality of value investing in pursuit of strong risk-adjusted returns throughout the market cycle'.

Ivcap Management has launched the MyETF Dow Jones US Titans 50, its first US dollar denominated shariah-compliant security to be listed on Bursa Malaysia Securities, entirely tradeable in US dollars. The initial approved fund size is up to 500 million units, with an initial issue price of US$1 per unit.