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• Weekly ETF Fund Flows: Equities Lead Inflows
• Daily ETF Flows: GLD Sheds $254M
• GLD Sees Its Biggest And First Inflow In 2 Months

• GLD 77% Rate It
• IEI 0% Rate It
• SHY 0% Rate It
• SPY 54% Rate It
• TIP 100% Rate It

Investors plowed more than $37 billion into U.S.-listed ETFs in September, the most since $29 billion of inflows in January of this year, as markets took to heart the Federal Reserve's latest move to stimulate the economy with a fresh round of bond buying, and took on risk, particularly in equities.

Overall, total U.S.-listed ETF assets rose 5.3 percent to $1.301 trillion from $1.235 trillion at the end of August, according to data compiled by IndexUniverse. At the end of September-and at the end of the third quarter-ETF assets were just shy of a record of nearly $1.311 trillion set on Wednesday, Sept. 19.

More than $30 billion of the September flows were in stock funds, with $22 billion of those targeting U.S. equities. In the third quarter, inflows totaled nearly $60 billion, just topping first-quarter inflows of $56 billion and nearly tripling second-quarter flows of $20.41 billion. Total assets at the end of last month were up 22.5 percent from the end of 2011, and up a third from $973.5 million a year ago.

The simple possibility of the Fed's third round of quantitative easing-QE3 in market-speak-was enough to bring investors back in droves in the third quarter and in September in particular. Similar easy-money moves by the European Central Bank and by the Bank of Japan aimed at supporting fragile growth in the global economy also encouraged investors to take risks.

Popular Funds

Some of the market's biggest and most liquid equities funds were the beneficiaries of all the central bank policies, led by the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (NYSEArca:SPY), which gathered $10.5 billion in September and just over $9 billion in the entire third quarter.

Gold was also a beneficiary of QE3, as investors again fretted that with the dollar weakening, gold and other precious metals would become more reliable stores of value.

SPDR Gold Shares (NYSEArca:GLD), the $75 billion bullion fund, hauled in $1.8 billion in September and $2.41 billion in all of the third quarter.

Gold is quickly headed for $1,900 a troy ounce and, as we reported separately, silver-related ETFs were among the very-best-performing ETFs in the third quarter, rising by anywhere from around a quarter to a third in the June-September quarter.

SSgA, iShares … And  FlexShares

State Street Global Advisors came out on top in the asset-gathering game in September, pulling in more than $16 billion last month. BlackRock's iShares, the biggest ETF company in the world, meanwhile gathered $18.3 billion in assets in the third quarter-more than any other ETF fund sponsor. For the first time in quite awhile, Vanguard didn't top the asset-gathering.

At the end of the third quarter, iShares had assets of almost $526 billion, SSgA had about $327 billion and Vanguard had just over $230 billion.

One relatively new ETF firm that had a solid third quarter was FlexShares, the unit of Chicago-based Northern Trust.

The company, which has a lineup of six funds, including three that canvass the global equities universe through the lens of small-cap/value tilts, gathered $652 million in the quarter and ended the period with more than $1.6 billion in assets. It launched its first four funds in September 2011.

Biggest Losers

A number of prominent bond funds littered our list of the least-popular ETFs in both September and the third quarter, as investors shed relatively safe fixed-income investments and took on more risk in the equities market.

In September, the iShares Barclays 3-7 Year Treasury Bond Fund (NYSEArca:IEI) shed $852.5 million in assets, ending the month with just over $2 billion in assets.

In the entire third quarter, the iShares Barclays 1-3 Year Treasury Bond Fund (NYSEArca:SHY) suffered outflows of $2.25 billion and ended the period with assets of almost $8.6 billion.

The U.S. ETF market's single-biggest fixed-income fund, the iShares Barclays TIPS Bond Fund (NYSEArca:TIP), recorded redemptions of $436 million in September and $349 million in the entire third quarter. It ended the period with just over $23 billion in assets.

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