Jon Erlichman, Host of Ticker Take and Stephanie Wolfe, head of marketing at Global X Investments Canada Inc., together at the company's Toronto office on Oct. 7.Cole Burston/The Globe and Mail
Asset manager Global X Investments Canada Inc. is partnering with former BNN Bloomberg news anchor Jon Erlichman to launch a financial literacy YouTube channel that will help boost the company’s access to do-it-yourself investors.
Exchange-traded funds provider Global X is set to announce Tuesday that it will be an exclusive sponsor to a new YouTube channel called “Ticker Take with Jon Erlichman,” which will produce regular investing content to inform Canadians about financial markets, as well as financial commentary, news and education.
Mr. Erlichman, a long-time news anchor who departed BNN on Sept. 30, plans to shift his investing news to a broader audience across multiple social-media platforms. Most recently, Mr. Erlichman was the host of The Open on BNN and has spent the last decade expanding his social-media presence to more than one million followers across Instagram, LinkedIn and TikTok.
“I’ve covered business and investing for a very long time, and I’ve seen the evolution on how the industry is reaching investors,” Mr. Erlichman said in an interview. “There are now different global platforms where people are exploring content – and creating content – and that really has shifted the way that I think we learn and talk about investing.”
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One of the groups tapping into alternative options for financial advice is do-it-yourself investors. They are a growing cohort of Canadians who opened a wave of new trading accounts during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic as billions of dollars of savings were poured into bank accounts. In 2021, more than 3.6 million new DIY accounts were opened at discount brokerages, according to data provided by Toronto-based Investor Economics, a unit of ISS Market Intelligence, a big jump from 846,000 in 2019.
Today, there are more than 12 million trading accounts in Canada, with 1.7 million new accounts opened in 2023.
As a result, a surge of financial influencers – or “fin-fluencers” – have emerged on various social-media platforms to provide quick video content on topics such as how to save, how to invest and how the stock market functions.
Stephanie Wolfe, Global X’s head of marketing, said the company first began exploring a social-media partnership earlier this year after seeing how consumer behaviour is changing and deciding to ensure it is “in line” with those changes.
“Canadians are increasingly turning online for personal finance insights, and we want to meet them there,” Ms. Wolfe said. “This is a pivotal moment to bridge the gap between traditional financial institutions and retail investors, leveraging the power of social media to deliver real value, in a responsible manner, where it matters most.”
Tuesday’s announcement also follows a critical shift in the country’s investment landscape, as Canadian ETF assets held within the DIY channel – also known as the discount brokerage channel – have eclipsed assets managed by financial advisers for the first time since the introduction of the investment products more than 30 years ago.
In the first half of 2024, Canadian-listed ETF assets in the discount brokerage channel grew by more than 40 per cent – largely driven by DIY investors purchasing funds, according to a recent report by Investor Economics.
Global X chief executive Rohit Mehta said DIY investors already account for a third of ETF sales at the company, but he wants to ensure he keeps those investors. The remaining sales, he says, are split evenly between institutional clients and financial advisers.
“I’d love to keep that balance of users in the context of what the industry is doing,” Mr. Mehta said. “We have very lofty goals and for us to achieve them, we have to be strong in all three key purchasing users of ETFs today in Canada.”
Another added benefit of the partnership with Mr. Erlichman, he said, is the expanded generational reach.
“My kids are on social media all the time but they’re not watching BNN,” Mr. Mehta said. “So, I’m thinking ahead of how do we connect with the next generation. And this group – the millennials and zoomers – are going to be inheriting a significant amount of wealth over the next 30 years, so financial literacy is going to be important now more than ever for that cohort.”