Published May 23, 2026
While many people mistakenly assume the United States created the vehicle, Canada beat Wall Street to the punch by nearly three years.
The Birth of the ETF: TIPs 35
On March 9, 1990, the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) launched the Toronto 35 Index Participation Units (TIPs).
- What it did: It allowed retail and institutional investors to buy a single basket of securities that tracked the 35 largest companies in Canada.
- The Legacy: TIPs served as the global prototype for what we know as the modern ETF. Over the years, it evolved and is still traded today as the iShares S&P/TSX 60 Index ETF (XIU), making it the oldest existing ETF in the world.
The Common Misconception: The U.S. “Spider”
The reason most people think the U.S. invented the ETF is because of the massive popularity of the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY).
- State Street and the American Stock Exchange (AMEX) launched SPY in January 1993.
- While SPY didn’t come first, it revolutionized the global market structure because it was the first to successfully automate the creation/redemption mechanism at a massive scale. Today, it remains the largest ETF in the world.
Canada’s History of “Firsts”
Following the success of TIPs, Canada’s favorable regulatory environment turned Bay Street into a testing ground for investment innovation:
- 1990: World’s first Equity ETF (TIPs)
- 2000: World’s first Fixed-Income/Bond ETF (iShares Core Canadian Universe Bond Index ETF)
- 2021: World’s first retail Bitcoin ETF (Purpose Bitcoin ETF)
The Big Picture: What started as a niche experiment in Toronto in 1990 completely transformed global investing, democratizing diversification for everyday retail investors.