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Fidelity recently polled nearly 600 high net worth investors to gain a better understanding of their thinking about the market and where they plan to invest in 2014. Notably, 43% of investors said they are planning to increase their investment in ETFs over the next 12 months.

Fidelity created this graphic that highlights 5 reasons investors use ETFs (or don’t use them).

Other key findings of the Fidelity study include:

Despite the small gains this year in the DJIA (1.6% as of June 5, 2014), 55% believe it will end the year up 5% or more.

When it comes to the U.S. economy, investors continue to feel cautious. The majority (71%) feels it’s headed in the right direction vs. 29% who say it’s stagnant or headed in the wrong direction.

62% of investors also believe a market correction—when a major index declines by at least 10% from a recent high—is likely to happen in 2014.

The indicators that would motivate the most investors holding cash to re-invest into the market are a stronger U.S. economy (28%) and higher interest (12%). 25% report holding no cash on the sidelines.

Over half (59%) of investors prefer to grow their portfolio by investing in domestic equities vs. 18% in international equities.

Over a third (35%) invest in ETFs for broad market exposure (indexes), while 27% of investors don’t invest in ETFs because they need to learn more.

Advantages of ETFs

ETFs have several features that are advantageous to investors:

ETFs are generally transparent regarding their holdings.

ETFs can be bought and sold during the trading day. This offers additional opportunities for investors.

Stop orders can be used to limit the downside movement of your ETFs.

ETFs can also be sold short just like stocks.

Many index ETFs carry low expense ratios and can be quite cheap to own.

Many ETFs are quite tax-efficient.

ETFs can provide a low cost, straightforward way to invest in core market indexes.

Disadvantages of ETFs

ETFs can be bought and sold just like stocks. In some cases this could serve to promote excessive trading that could prove detrimental to investors.

ETF providers have introduced a proliferation of new ETFs in response to their popularity. Some of these ETFs are excellent, some are not. Many new ETFs are based on untested benchmarks that have only been back-tested. Additionally there are a number of leveraged ETFs that multiply the movement of the underlying index by 2 or 3 times up or down. While there is nothing inherently wrong with these products they can easily be misused by investors who don’t fully understand them.

Trading ETFs generally entails paying a transaction fee, though a number of providers have introduced commission-free ETFs in order to gain market share.

ETFs have proven to be a great innovation for investors. If used properly they are a great addition to your investing toolkit. Like any investment make sure you understand what you are investing in (and why) before you invest.

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