ETFs continue to be the top investment option with financial advisors, with 87 percent saying they use the products for their clients, according to a new survey by the Financial Planning Association (FPA).
But even though some in the investment world continue to go bonkers over bitcoin, advisors in the survey expressed a deep mistrust of the new tech-investment.
It marked the fourth straight year ETFs were cited as the top choice by advisors in the annual survey, and the eighth year in a row that ETFs have grown in popularity among financial advisors, according to the FPA.
In another trend that could be related to advisors' embrace of ETFs, survey respondents also demonstrated a slight lean towards passive investments, with 22 percent saying passive management provides the best performance, up from 15 percent a year ago.
"With only 200 active ETFs out of a universe of nearly 5,000, the continued rise in advisors' use of this investment vehicle is clearly congruent with the uptick in their adoption of a purely passive approach to investing," David Yeske, practitioner editor of the Journal of Financial Planning, said in a prepared statement.
Yeske noted that 65 percent of advisors said they favor a blend of active and passive management, but "these results suggest that the ratio may be shifting in favor of passive."
The survey also found that when it comes to perhaps the most cutting-edge investment on the block these days, cryptocurrencies, advisors are paying attention, but at the same time keeping their distance.
While 53 percent of advisors are fielding questions about cryptocurrencies from clients, only 1 percent said they are using them as investments, according to the FPA.
Only 2 percent of surveyed advisors said they viewed cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin as a viable investment option that has a place in a portfolio, while 24 percent view them as a "gamble"; 29 percent consider them an "interesting concept to keep an eye on, but not invest in yet"; 18 percent view them as a "fad that is best avoided"; and 26 percent rule them out as "not a viable investment option."
The survey was based on responses from 265 advisors "of various backgrounds and business models" received in April and May, according to the FPA, which conducted the survey with the Journal of Financial Planning and the FPA Research and Practice Institute.