Here are the global implications of Schwab entering the U.S. ETF market, and an explanation about why ETFs are a game-changer.

I remember some years ago I sat on a panel at the Schwab conference with Bruce Bond and Tony Rochte. In the run-up to the conference, there was a big hubbub about Schwab saying that they were blocking ETF people out of the conference altogether. There was some kind of a skirmish, and then they ended up letting the ETF riffraff in.

But it's been clear for a long time that the big brokers and institutional players are not all that excited about the idea of pushing assets (and an annually recurring revenue stream in the form of an expense ratio) to their (sometimes) competition for the price of a stock commission.

THAT is the reason that Goldman and Morgan announced the "Source" ETF venture (no recent word on that, BTW) and that big institutional players have banded together on ventures like the ICE (which just announced its record 2008 results, BTW).

In short, it's a signal seeing all these big boys getting involved in the ETF business (and with many more now looking at entering the business) that ETFs are the REAL DEAL. And there's gigantic trading volume and assets flowing through these things.

Have a look at the U.S. pipeline only. It's insane. I just went into our ETF Watch feature, and there are 497 ETFs that we list that are in registration at the SEC, and about TEN new issuers queued up to hit the market. And just from what I hear behind the scenes, there are a whole bunch more that are not even in registration yet, but that are actively looking at the ETF business. And you thought we were in a tough market.

Nice blog on USO, Matt. I've been looking at those huge flows and have been slightly baffled by it myself. I really do think a lot of investors in the futures and swaps-based products don't really understand some of the products they're investing in.

Also as another blog side note, Paul and I have been getting into a nice discussion about the massive sales job that's been put on the bailout of some of the robber baron guys & the implications of that. Paul asks, so "Do We Want Free Markets?" to which I answer, apparently we do "Only When We're Winning."