If you could design your retirement portfolio using only exchange-traded funds, would you? That’s the opportunity investment platforms Pearler and Stockspot are offering in the hope of luring younger savers to their superannuation businesses.

The pitch is this: big super funds are charging higher fees to cover active management and the complexities of buying and holding unlisted assets like airports, whereas most ETFs – which generally track, rather than attempt to outperform, an index – are simple and, best of all, cheap.