Daily ETF Watch: SSgA Debuts R1000 Trio

Today saw the launch of seven ETFs on the NYSE Arca, including three funds from State Street Global Advisors that track factor-focused versions of the Russell 1000 index. Other funds launched from Direxion and via FactorShares’ exemptive relief.

3 New SPDRs
The three new funds from SSgA offer multifactor approaches to the Russell 1000 that encompass high-value, high-quality and low-size characteristics, but each one also showcases a fourth factor. The ETFs are as follows:

• SPDR Russell 1000 Momentum Focus ETF (ONEO)
• SPDR Russell 1000 Low Volatility Focus ETF (ONEV)
• SPDR Russell 1000 Yield Focus ETF (ONEY)

Russell 1000 companies are reweighted in the new indexes by their multifactor score, which comprises the value, size and quality factors as well as each fund’s fourth, unique factor. Companies that have particularly low scores/weights are excluded from the resulting new indexes.

ONEY’s underlying index included 250 components as of Sept. 30, while ONEO’s index had 894 and ONEV’s had 396. Each fund comes with an expense ratio of 0.20%.

Direxion Resurrects Funds
Direxion rolled out three new ETFs, but two are actually resurrections of funds previously offered by the firm.

The Direxion Daily S&P Biotech Bear 1X Shares (LABS) is brand new and offers inverse, or -100%, exposure to the S&P Biotechnology Select Industry Index. It comes with an expense ratio of 0.45%.

Meanwhile, the Direxion Daily Natural Gas Related Bear 3X Shares (GASX) and the Direxion Daily Healthcare Bear 3X Shares (SICK) provide -300% exposure to their respective underlying indexes, the ISE-Revere Natural Gas Index and the Health Care Select Sector Index. Both funds charge expense ratios of 0.95%.

Newcomer Highlights New Area
Finally, a new ETF brand has broken ground in terms of coverage, with the launch of the Tierra XP Latin America Real Estate ETF (LARE) via the FactorShares exemptive relief. LARE tracks an index of Latin American companies that generate the majority of their revenues from real-estate-related ventures, an area of the global markets that had yet to be specifically targeted by the ETF industry.

The fund’s underlying index covers four areas: REITs, developers, property owners/operators and companies that provide services to real estate companies and infrastructure developments. The index screens potential components for size and liquidity thresholds and weights the remaining pool of companies based on market capitalization, liquidity and dividend yield, the prospectus said.

LARE comes with an expense ratio of 0.79%.

4 ProShares Switch To BATS

Exchange operator BATS Global Markets is a relative newcomer among the U.S. exchanges that list ETFs. However, it’s made some impressive headway in the space in the last couple years, consistently ranking as the No. 1 exchange for ETF trading in the U.S. and executing more than a quarter of ETF trading volume each month. Most recently, ProShares moved the primary listings of four of its existing ETFs from the NYSE Arca exchange to BATS.

Notably, none of the ETFs in question are inverse or leveraged strategies, an approach that ProShares is known for. The funds and their assets are as follows:

• ProShares Large Cap Core Plus (CSM | B-89), $412.8 million
• ProShares Russell 2000 Dividend Growers ETF (SMDV | F-49), $9.5 million
• ProShares S&P MidCap 400 Dividend Aristocrats ETF (REGL | F-61), $13.3 million
• ProShares Morningstar Alternatives Solution ETF (ALTS | D), $27 million

The change will become effective as of Dec. 15.

Although such moves are not unheard of, they are unusual. And we could be seeing more similar moves in the future. As of Oct. 1, the exchange operator launched its BATS ETF Marketplace, which, among other things, pays issuers to list their ETFs with BATS. Usually, issuers have to pay the exchange to list its ETF.

Most ETFs have their primary listings on the NYSE Arca, followed by the Nasdaq stock exchange, but since BATS implemented its Marketplace program, nearly a quarter of the ETFs that have made their debut have designated BATS as their primary exchange.

Contact Heather Bell at [email protected].