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While Canada has been in the headlines for reasons its citizens may not like, a recent milestone highlights our northern neighbor’s financial ingenuity.
On March 9, 1990, the world’s first exchange-traded fund began trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange, or TSX. The fund, the Toronto 35 Index Participation Units, or TIPs, tracked the performance of the 35 biggest stocks on the TSX.
The Millennial-era ETF arrived three years before the $619.6 billion S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) began trading in January 1993. That fund, of course, went on to become the world’s largest, a title it lost for several days last month to the $612.1 billion Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO).
The TIPs ETF followed a different trajectory. According to TSX, the fund merged with the TSE 100 Index Participation Fund and is now known as the iShares S&P/TSX 60 Index ETF. It’s run by BlackRock Inc.’s (BLK) iShares trading under the XIU ticker on the TSX with C$15.4 billion. It’s gained 22% over the past year through Feb. 28.
"We are extremely proud to see that ETFs—a Canadian invention—have changed the financial markets and the way that investors interact with markets around the world," Toronto Stock Exchange CEO Louis Anastasopoulos said in a press statement.
Canadian ETF Leadership
Canada’s leadership in ETFs didn’t end with the TIPs launch. According to the TSX, the exchange listed the world's first fixed-income ETF in 2000 and the world's first bitcoin ETF in 2021.
At the end of January 2025, TSX ETFs held more than $560 billion in assets under management across 1,073 products, according to the release. In 2024, $753 billion worth of ETF units were traded in Canada, with options available on 53 ETFs through the Montréal Exchange.
The country’s ETF industry holds $600 billion in assets. While Canada was first to market with an ETF, the U.S. industry has surpassed it in size, topping $10 trillion in assets last year.