Deutsche Bank has expanded its research offering with a new publication for index investors in a move which reflects the ever-increasing interest in index-linked products like exchange-traded funds.

The publication’s focus is purely on analysing indices, rather than recommending individual products, the bank said in a statement, and as Deutsche is itself a market maker for index-tracking products the research is intended to be “agnostic” in terms of the products covered.

“Investment managers and other investors are increasingly shifting from traditional stock and bond picking to dynamic investing based on asset allocation models. It was therefore thought necessary to have regular analysis specifically aimed at these investors,” said Lars Slomka, research strategist and lead author of the reports.

The first edition of Fundamental Index Views analyses the prospects for the German Dax30 equity index.

The rising popularity of index-linked investment products, and in particular ETFs, has been well documented and is being driven by investors’ appetite for low-cost, transparent investment vehicles. However, such products are not without their detractors; last week the prominent UK fund manager Terry Smith came out to warn that products such as ETFs may not be as “inactive” as they claim to be and also that funds using swap agreements may actually present significant counter-party risks.

That said, the growth of the ETF market shows no sign of letting up, with iShares – the world’s largest provider of such products – last week announcing that it had reached $100 billion in assets under management in Europe.