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Designed to provide broad exposure to the Broad Developed World ETFs category of the market, the Invesco FTSE RAFI Developed Markets exU.S. ETF (PXF) is a smart beta exchange traded fund launched on 06/25/2007.
What Are Smart Beta ETFs?
For a long time now, the ETF industry has been flooded with products based on market capitalization weighted indexes, which are designed to represent the broader market or a particular market segment.
Because market cap weighted indexes provide a low-cost, convenient, and transparent way of replicating market returns, they work well for investors who believe in market efficiency.
If you're the kind of investor who would rather try and beat the market through good stock selection, then smart beta funds are your best choice; this fund class is known for tracking non-cap weighted strategies.
This kind of index follows this same mindset, as it attempts to pick stocks that have better chances of risk-return performance; non-cap weighted strategies base selection on certain fundamental characteristics, or a mix of such characteristics.
The smart beta space gives investors many different choices, from equal-weighting, one of the simplest strategies, to more complicated ones like fundamental and volatility/momentum based weighting. However, not all of these methodologies have been able to deliver remarkable returns.
Fund Sponsor & Index
The fund is sponsored by Invesco. It has amassed assets over $1.06 billion, making it one of the larger ETFs in the Broad Developed World ETFs. Before fees and expenses, PXF seeks to match the performance of the FTSE RAFI Developed ex-U.S. Index.
The FTSE RAFI Developed ex U.S. 1000 Index is designed to track the performance of the largest developed market equities, excluding the US, selected based on the following four fundamental measures of firm size: book value, cash flow, sales and dividends.
Cost & Other Expenses
When considering an ETF's total return, expense ratios are an important factor. And, cheaper funds can significantly outperform their more expensive cousins in the long term if all other factors remain equal.
Annual operating expenses for PXF are 0.45%, which makes it on par with most peer products in the space.
It has a 12-month trailing dividend yield of 5.68%.
Sector Exposure and Top Holdings
Most ETFs are very transparent products, and disclose their holdings on a daily basis. ETFs also offer diversified exposure, which minimizes single stock risk, though it's still important for investors to research a fund's holdings.
Looking at individual holdings, Shell Plc (SHEL) accounts for about 2.68% of total assets, followed by Totalenergies Se (TTE) and Bp Plc (BP/).