Links: Website, Prospectus

Investment Strategy:

ONEF is an actively-managed ETF that is a fund of funds looking to achieve long-term capital appreciation by investing at least 80% of its assets in the shares of other ETFs. The underlying ETFs that the fund invests in can be holding companies of any size in both developed and emerging markets. There is restriction on how much of the portfolio may be invested in foreign companies. The advisor of the fund, US One Inc, will utilize an asset allocation strategy that pre-determines a target mix of investment types for the fund and then implements the strategy by selecting securities that best represent each of the desired investment types. ONEF may also invest in ETFs holding fixed-income securities, but will invest primarily in those that hold equities. The ETF will have total expenses of 0.51%, including a 0.35% management fee. The portfolio will be benchmarked to the S&P500 and will generally buy and hold securities, with minimal portfolio turnover which is not expected to exceed 10% of the portfolio’s value.

Portfolio Managers:

U.S. One Inc., based out of Nevada, will be responsible for the management of the fund. U.S. One is a registered investment advisory firm which focuses on low-cost and simple investing, following buy-and-hold principles. Specifically, the portfolio manager the fund will be:

Paul Hrabal – Paul is the President of U.S. One Inc. and founded the investment advisor in 2008. Prior to founding the Adviser, Mr. Hrabal was, from 2002 to 2009, President of U.S. Data Trust Corporation, a provider of data backup and disaster recovery services for small to mid-sized businesses. Previously, Mr. Hrabal founded an internet company, GoVote.com, Inc. in July 1999, which he sold in March 2000, and was Director of Finance and Business Development with Dell Computer from August 1992 to July 1999

The Numbers:

Expense Ratio – 0.51%, including 0.35% in management fees

What’s special about it?

1. ONEF specifically states that it will not utilize derivatives. It may invest in ETFs that hold derivatives but will not invest in ETFs that use derivatives as a principal investment strategy.

2. The fund can also only invest in ETFs traded in the US, even though they may hold securities that are traded in foreign markets.

Disclosure: No positions in above-mentioned names.

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Links: Prospectus

Investment Strategy:

GRV is an actively-managed ETF planned by AdvisorShares that looks to beat the MSCI World Index while have little correlation with the index. The fund takes operates by taking long and short positions in ETFs representing different sectors, regions, countries and styles, in order to benefit from relative outperformance. The fund’s sub-advisor, HTE Asset Management, maintains an equal amount long and short dollar exposure, hence being beta-neutral and minimizing directional influences of the market. However, in directional markets, GRV may take an additional 50% long or short exposure on top of its core market-neutral long/short portfolio, in order to generate additional profits. HTE looks to implement this directional overlay using liquid future contracts on major equity indices.

Portfolio Managers:

HTE Asset Management manages in excess of $170 million in assets and is based out of Colorado Springs. The portfolio is managed by:

Jason D. Huntley, Founder – Jason Huntley is the Founder of HTE, and also the Founder and Managing Partner of HTE Asset Management, LLC. Mr. Huntley founded HTE in 1997 after spending five years advising affluent families and institutional clients for boutique firms in California and Colorado.

David A. Houle, Director of Research – David Houle works directly with Mr. Huntley to oversee strategy development, trading and risk management, which he has done since joining the firm in August 2002.

Elliott J. Orsillo – Elliott Orsillo joined HTE in October 2009 after working for six years as a portfolio manager at Russell Investments and a financial analyst for Southern California Edison

Gregory L. Thatcher – Gregory Thatcher joined HTE in April 2000 after working for nearly 15 years in the brokerage industry with Piper Jaffray and Stifel, Nicolaus & Company.

The Numbers:

Expense Ratio – Unspecified

Analysis:

Positives –

- GRV will be the first Active ETF in the US to employ a hedge-fund style, relative value strategy that is generally market neutral. Such a strategy will interest sophisticated investors, both retail and institutional, that previously only had hedge-funds as options to access such a strategy.

Negatives –

- By utilizing other ETFs to implement its long-short strategy, GRV might be layering on expenses as it will have to factor in as costs the expense ratios of the underlying ETFs that invests in. This will very likely lead to an above average expense ratio for the fund.

Disclosure: No positions in above-mentioned names.

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Disclaimer: Views and opinions expressed on EtfsHub are those of the author alone and do not in any way represent the official views, positions or opinions of the employers – both past or present – of the author in question, or any other institutions and corporations associated with the author. Neither the information nor any opinions contained or expressed above and elsewhere on EtfsHub constitutes or should be construed as a solicitation or offer by EtfsHub to buy or sell any securities or other financial instruments or to provide any investment advice or recommendations. EtfsHub shall not be liable for any claims or losses of any nature, arising indirectly or directly from use of the information on or accessed through the site. Please see full disclaimers here.

Links: Prospectus

Investment Strategy:

AADR is an Active ETF planned by AdvisorShares that invests in a portfolio of ETFs, ADRs of foreign companies and in swap contracts in order to beat its benchmarks – the BNY Mellon Classic ADR Index and the MSCI EAFE Index. The fund looks to gain exposure to leading non-US companies that strong management teams and business strategies. The fund’s sub-advisor, WCM Investment Management, identifies sectors and industries that are most likely to benefit from global economic trends. The typical time horizon for investments is 3-5 years and the fund will tend to hold fewer than 30 securities. WCM focuses on large-caps operating in the technology, consumer discretionary / staples and healthcare sectors.

Portfolio Managers:

WCM Investment Management provides the day-to-day portfolio management services for AADR and has about $1.4billion in asset under management. The portfolio is managed by:

Paul R. Black, Portfolio Manager, President & Co-CEO – Paul Black has been in the investment business for 26 years and has previous portfolio management experience with Wells Fargo and Bank of America.

Kurt R. Winrich, CFA, Portfolio Manager, Chairman & Co-CEO – Kurt Winrich has over 25 years of experience in the investment business and was the head of computer-aided design and analysis at Hughes Electronics Santa Barbara Research Center.

Peter J. Hunkel, JD, Portfolio Manager & Business Analyst – His 11-year career in the investment business includes positions as Chief Operating Officer and Senior Portfolio Manager for Centurion Alliance and as a portfolio analyst for the Templeton Private Client Group.

Michael B. Trigg, Portfolio Manager & Business Analyst – Michael Trigg has spent 9 years in the investment field and previously worked at Morningstar, where he managed their model Growth Portfolio and covered a variety of companies in the technology industry.

Past Performance –

1. The prospectus provides the performance of a “Focused Growth International Composite”, which represents 12 accounts managed by WCM with similar objectives, policies, strategies and risk to those of AADR. This composite has outperformed the MSCI EAFE benchmark in every period, including since inception (12/1/2004) by 7.55%.

The Numbers:

Expense Ratio – Capped at 1.25% till Nov 22, 2010 (by contractual agreement)

Analysis:

Positives –

- A track record that includes beating the MSCI EAFE by 7.55% since inception is very hard to overlook. While no guarantee for the future, such performance will inspire confidence in investors considering an investment in AADR.

Negatives –

- As with AdvisorShares’ existing product, DENT, AADR will also come in with a higher expense ratio than most funds, at 1.25%. This may well be a deterrent for investors, but a high expense hasn’t appeared to be a hurdle for DENT, which now has the largest market cap for an actively-managed equity ETF, despite a hefty 1.56% expense ratio.

Disclosure: No positions in above-mentioned names.

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Disclaimer: Views and opinions expressed on EtfsHub are those of the author alone and do not in any way represent the official views, positions or opinions of the employers – both past or present – of the author in question, or any other institutions and corporations associated with the author. Neither the information nor any opinions contained or expressed above and elsewhere on EtfsHub constitutes or should be construed as a solicitation or offer by EtfsHub to buy or sell any securities or other financial instruments or to provide any investment advice or recommendations. EtfsHub shall not be liable for any claims or losses of any nature, arising indirectly or directly from use of the information on or accessed through the site. Please see full disclaimers here.

First Trust has filed for two new Active ETFs, the first of which is the First Trust Developed International Markets AlphaDEX Fund and the second is called the First Trust Emerging Markets AlphaDEX Fund. Both of these products utilize the fund’s AlphaDEX methodology which involves selecting the highest ranking securities according to a proprietary quantitative model which are then separated into 5 groups, with higher ranked securities receiving a larger weight in the overall portfolio. The funds are rebalanced on a quarterly basis.

The difference between the two funds comes in when identifying the universe of investable companies. The Developed International Markets fund invests in mid-large cap companies in non-US developed markets, which include Japan, Hong Kong, Western Europe, Canada, New Zealand and Australia. In comparison, the Emerging Markets fund invests mid-large cap companies in emerging countries that “are in the initial stages of their industrialization cycles and have lower market liquidity compared to developed market peers”. Also, while the Developed Markets fund starts off with an initial universe of 300 securities, the Emerging Markets fund uses a narrower universe of 150 highest ranking securities.

Both portfolios are managed by a committee which is chaired by Daniel J. Lindquist, an SVP of First Trust and also includes other top brass at the firm.

The expenses and tickers of these new Active ETFs have yet to be announced.

Disclosure: No positions in Active ETFs.

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Disclaimer: Views and opinions expressed on EtfsHub are those of the author alone and do not in any way represent the official views, positions or opinions of the employers – both past or present – of the author in question, or any other institutions and corporations associated with the author. Neither the information nor any opinions contained or expressed above and elsewhere on EtfsHub constitutes or should be construed as a solicitation or offer by EtfsHub to buy or sell any securities or other financial instruments or to provide any investment advice or recommendations. EtfsHub shall not be liable for any claims or losses of any nature, arising indirectly or directly from use of the information on or accessed through the site. Please see full disclaimers here.

Links: Prospectus

Investment Strategy:

PPRM invests at least 65% of its assets in US$ fixed income securities that mature within 397 days. Alternatively, the fund may invest in US government agency securities which mature in less than 2 years. PPRM looks to maximize current income while preserving capital and liquidity and the average duration of the portfolio does not exceed 90 days. The fund invests mainly securities rated higher than A by Moody’s.

Portfolio Managers:

PIMCO serves as the investment manager of (MINT: 100.76 0.00%). PIMCO has more than $940 billion in assets under management as of Sep 30, 2009 and over $75 billion in only short duration strategies.

Jerome Schneider – Executive Vice President at PIMCO, joined PIMCO in 2008 after serving as Senior Managing Director with Bear Stearns where he specialized in credit and mortgage-related funding transactions.

The Numbers:

Expense Ratio – Capped at 0.25% till Oct 31, 2011 (by contractual agreement), 0.38% after that.

What’s in it for investors?

1. PPRM is the third of PIMCO’s Active ETFs targeted at cash investors and has the tightest constraints and invests in the shortest maturity securities. Again, PPRM looks to beat out its competition by using its low expense as its prime weapon with comparable mutual funds having a net expense in the range of 0.50% – 0.90%.
 
Disclaimer: Views and opinions expressed on EtfsHub are those of the author alone and do not in any way represent the official views, positions or opinions of the employers – both past or present – of the author in question, or any other institutions and corporations associated with the author. Neither the information nor any opinions contained or expressed above and elsewhere on EtfsHub constitutes or should be construed as a solicitation or offer by EtfsHub to buy or sell any securities or other financial instruments or to provide any investment advice or recommendations. EtfsHub shall not be liable for any claims or losses of any nature, arising indirectly or directly from use of the information on or accessed through the site. Please see full disclaimers here.

Links: Prospectus

Investment Strategy:

GOVY tries to achieve maximum current income without compromising on capital preservation and liquidity. It invests 80% (under normal conditions) of its fund in debt securities issued or guaranteed by the US government, its agencies or government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs). However, un-invested assets may be placed in other investment grade US$, fixed-income securities from US issuers, that are rated Aa or higher by Moody’s. GOVY can only invest in securities which mature in less than 2 years and on average the portfolio duration will not exceed 1 year.

Portfolio Managers:

PIMCO serves as the investment manager of (MINT: 100.76 0.00%). PIMCO has more than $940 billion in assets under management as of Sep 30, 2009 and over $75 billion in only short duration strategies.

Jerome Schneider – Executive Vice President at PIMCO, joined PIMCO in 2008 after serving as Senior Managing Director with Bear Stearns where he specialized in credit and mortgage-related funding transactions.

The Numbers:

Expense Ratio – Capped at 0.25% till Oct 31, 2011 (by contractual agreement), 0.42% after that.

What’s in it for investors?

1. GOVY is the second of 3 PIMCO Active ETFs targeted at cash investors and is looking to compete directly with the money market fund space. And compete is shall very effectively, once its launched, because its expense ratio of 0.25% beats the average expense ratios of money market funds (around  0.50%) hands down.

Disclosure: No positions in mentioned names.
 
Disclaimer: Views and opinions expressed on EtfsHub are those of the author alone and do not in any way represent the official views, positions or opinions of the employers – both past or present – of the author in question, or any other institutions and corporations associated with the author. Neither the information nor any opinions contained or expressed above and elsewhere on EtfsHub constitutes or should be construed as a solicitation or offer by EtfsHub to buy or sell any securities or other financial instruments or to provide any investment advice or recommendations. EtfsHub shall not be liable for any claims or losses of any nature, arising indirectly or directly from use of the information on or accessed through the site. Please see full disclaimers here.