The European Fund and Asset Management Association (EFAMA) has today published its 2025 industry Fact Book. This year’s edition includes an in-depth analysis of trends in the European investment fund industry (for 2024 and over the longer term) and an extensive overview of regulatory developments across 29 European countries. It also contains a series of info-boxes addressing some important regulatory topics EFAMA is actively working on, including retail investment, sustainability reporting, securitisation, financial data access, DEBRA, AI and tokenisation.
Key highlights on the long-term industry trends include:
Fund costs are coming down across the board for all major long-term UCITS types.
Equity UCITS saw their average costs gradually drop over the past years, declining by 21% between 2020 and 2024 to 0.75%. Average costs of bond UCITS dropped by 13% over the same period, down to 0.56%. Multi-asset UCITS remained pricier than other funds, but their costs also decreased by 8% to reach 1.16% on average.
Larger funds account for an ever-increasing share of the UCITS market.
UCITS funds smaller than EUR 100 million accounted for less than 4% of the total net assets of UCITS in 2024, and their share is declining sharply. In contrast, the proportion of larger funds - those over EUR 1 billion and especially those over EUR 10 billion - continues to rise, helped in recent years by the increased demand for ETFs and MMFs.
Passive UCITS are growing strongly in popularity.
The market share of passive UCITS rose from 11% in 2014 to 29% by end 2024, growing by three percentage points throughout 2024. This sharp rise reflects growing investor preference for ETFs.
US stocks increased their share to over half the asset allocation of equity UCITS.
The share of US stocks in the asset allocation of equity UCITS rose to 51% by the end of 2024, almost doubling from 26% in 2014. This was mainly due to US stock markets outperforming those in Europe, in particular the large US technology stocks. 2025 could finally see this trend reverse, as European stocks outperformed US ones in the first months of the year.
Additional key findings for 2024:
For the second year running, net sales of ETFs reached an all-time high.
UCITS ETFs attracted EUR 269 billion in net sales in 2024. The record net inflows into ETFs were primarily driven by equity ETFs (EUR 201 billion). These contrast with the non-ETF equity UCITS, which saw net outflows of EUR 53 billion throughout 2024, their second consecutive year of net outflows.
SFDR Article 9 fund sales turned negative, while those of Article 8 and 6 funds rebounded.
Net sales of SFDR Article 9 funds, which showed resilience during the 2022 market downturn, turned negative in 2024. Conversely, Article 6 and Article 8 funds saw a turnaround, with net inflows rising sharply. This shift was driven mainly by the surge in popularity of ETFs and MMFs.
The average annual 2024 performance of all major UCITS types outperformed the 5-year average.
Equity UCITS delivered on average 18.1%, multi-asset UCITS yielded 9.8%, bond UCITS 8.9% and money market funds 7.8%.
European households made strong fund purchases.
In 2023, funds faced direct competition from government bond issuances aimed at domestic retail investors. In 2024, however, retail purchases of debt securities dropped while fund acquisitions by households rose to EUR 258 billion, the second-highest level in the past decade. This confirms that European retail investors largely rely on investment funds to gain exposure to capital markets.
EFAMA’s Director General, Tanguy van de Werve commented:
“The 2025 edition of the EFAMA Fact Book shows an industry at a pivotal moment: fund concentration is increasing, asset allocations are shifting, and fund costs continue to decline. While sustainable finance faces headwinds, retail investors are stepping up their engagement, an encouraging sign for the success of the Savings and Investment Union (SIU). Key to that success will be the preservation of UCITS as a gold standard and the promotion of lifecycle investment strategies for retirement savings.”
Thomas Tilley, Senior Economist at EFAMA commented:
"Each year, the EFAMA research team expands its analysis of the European investment fund industry in the Fact Book. Amid the wealth of data and insights it offers, some emerging trends that might otherwise fly under the radar deserve attention. These include the strong growth of closed-ended AIFs in recent years, the waning popularity of sector-specific equity funds and inflation-linked bond UCITS, and the steady increase in cross-border fund ownership among European households, to name just a few."
- ENDS -
Notes to Editors
Graphs and country-specific data are available for reproduction.
For further information, please contact:
Hayley McEwen
Head of communications and member development
About the Fact Book
The Fact Book is one of EFAMA’s flagship publications. A digital version of the Fact Book is freely available on the EFAMA website.
An Excel-based statistical package is available for purchase, featuring data on the five largest asset managers in most European countries and over 50 tables with historical time series on net assets, net sales, and the number of UCITS and AIFs at the country level.
Additionally, a separate Excel package, including all 180+ charts from the Fact Book main analysis, is also available for purchase.
