More Than Just Gold And Silver: Sprott to Launch Platinum, Palladium ETFs

Sprott Asset Management, the firm run by noted precious metals bull Eric Sprott, plans to add to its offerings of exchange-traded products by introducing an ETF backed by physical holdings of platinum and palladium. The firm announced the plans in a recent filing. The filing said the new ETF will have an expense ratio of 0.5% with a proposed value of $115 million. Sprott currently issues the Sprott Physical Silver Trust PSLV and the Sprott Physical Gold Trust PHYS. Those ETFs are different from funds such as the SPDR Gold Shares GLD and the iShares Silver Trust SLV in that shares of the Sprott funds can be redeemed for physical holdings of gold and silver. PSLV holds just under $670 million in silver and trades at a 27% premium to its net asset value while PHYS holds about $2 billion worth of gold and trades at 3.23% premium to its NAV. The Sprott platinum and palladium ETF would compete with the ETFS Physical Platinum Shares PPLT and the ETFS Physical Palladium Shares PALL. The ETFS Physical White Metals Basket Shares WITE and the ETFS Physical PM Basket Shares GLTR also offer exposure to physical platinum and palladium.