Energy ETPs attract lion's share of commodity inflows in 2014

* U.S. investors focus on WTI crude and natural gas ETPs

* Total (Swiss: FP.SW - news) commodity outflows stabilise after nadir of 2013

* Broad-basket ETPs attract some $1 bln in net inflows

By Claire Milhench

LONDON, Jan 9 (Reuters) - The collapse in the oil price attracted bargain hunters to energy

exchange-traded products (ETPs) in 2014, with inflows leaping in December even as the sell-off

in oil intensified, global data from BlackRock (NYSE: BLK - news) and ETF Securities showed.

Investors in the United States accounted for about 85 percent of the $3 billion-plus inflow

into energy ETPs globally, ETF Securities, an issuer of ETPs, said.

"A lot of the flows were in WTI (U.S.) crude ETPs," said Martin Arnold, global FX and

commodity strategist at ETF Securities. "It's U.S. investors looking at the U.S. economy."

Natural gas accounted for about 25 percent of the inflows.

Oil prices have tumbled by over 55 percent since June, with the sell-off

accelerating after OPEC's decision at its November meeting not to cut production. Some U.S.

investors have taken the view the oil price has fallen too far, and will rebound as demand picks

up and some of the excess shale oil production is curbed.

"As the crude oil price continued to slide into the end of the year, investors have started

to hunt for the bottom," said Stephen Cohen, chief investment strategist for iShares EMEA at

BlackRock. "Energy equity ETPs saw similar flow trends."

The strong inflows into energy ETPs helped to offset the continued outflows from gold ETPs,

which remained a drag on the asset class as a whole. Excluding gold, total net inflows amounted

to $4.5 billion, ETF Securities said. With gold, commodities had net outflows of $30 million.

This was in sharp contrast to 2013, when a record $42.9 billion was withdrawn from commodity

ETPs, and was achieved despite another year when prices tumbled.

The S&P GSCI, a well-followed commodity index, was down 33.1 percent in 2014 as a stronger

dollar, over-supply issues and concerns about growth in China and Europe prompted big sell-offs

in commodities.

Assets under management (AUM) ended 2014 down 20.6 percent at about $102 billion, ETF

Securities said.

Arnold said almost all of the fall in AUM was due to price declines, as flows had proved

quite resilient. This was particularly the case in the broad-basket commodity ETPs segment,

which attracted some $1 billion for the year.

"Sentiment appears to be stabilising, and the flows numbers support this," he said. "Many

commodities are now trading at or below their marginal cost of production, attracting some

longer-term value investors."

Global commodities at end-December ($ mln)

SECTOR DEC 2014 FLOWS 2014 ASSETS 2014 FLOWS 2014 ASSETS

FLOWS(Black (BlackRock (BlackRock) (ETF (ETF

Rock) ) Securities) Securities)

Broad/Diversified 361.5 985.8 14,261.8 1,071 12,025

Agriculture -191 -484.4 4,294.4 -471 2,835

Energy 2,474.3 3,563.2 7,764.4 3,037 6,197

Industrial Metals -87 71.8 1,755.2 -2 1,295

Gold -609.7 -4,490.8 62,144.4 -4,562 64,262

Silver -405 310.4 9,239.8 151 9,501

Other Precious Metals 4.3 -337.9 4,503.8 747 5,399

TOTAL Precious Metals -1,010.3 -4,518.3 75,888 -3,663 79,160

TOTAL COMMODITIES 1,547.5 -382 103,963.8 -30 101,514

TOTAL ex-Gold 2,157.2 4,108.8 41,819 4,532 37,252

Sources: BlackRock, ETF Securities

(Reporting by Claire Milhench, editing by David Evans)