Korea Investment Trust Management said on Jan. 14 that net assets in its physical gold exchange-traded fund, the ACE KRX Physical Gold ETF, have surpassed 4 trillion won.

The Korea Exchange put the fund's net assets at 4.04 trillion won as of the previous day. That marks an increase of about 1 trillion won in roughly two months after the fund topped 3 trillion won in November.

The ACE KRX Physical Gold ETF is a physical gold ETF that Korea Investment Trust Management introduced in 2021 as the first such product among domestic asset managers. It tracks the KRX Physical Gold Index calculated and published by the Korea Exchange.

Physical gold ETFs do not incur futures contract roll costs or fund-of-funds costs. They can be purchased up to a 70 percent limit through defined contribution retirement pensions and individual retirement pension accounts.

It has also gained strong popularity in recent years amid a shift from risk assets to safe assets. The product recorded 1.2 trillion won in net purchases by retail investors last year, and also drew 29.6 billion won in net inflows from Jan. 2 to 13 this year.

The fund's returns over the past 1 year and 3 years were 64.30 percent and 178.88 percent, respectively. Its return over the past 6 months was also 46.75 percent, well above the average of 10 domestically listed gold ETFs, including leveraged products, of 37.98 percent.

Nam Yongsoo, head of ETF management at Korea Investment Trust Management, said the upward trend in gold prices would continue this year following 2025, due to demand for inflation hedges and gold purchases by central banks in various countries. He said long-term investment in physical gold products would be good, using pension accounts and similar tools.