Gerber Kawasaki Wealth Launches Active ETF: Portfolio Products

Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management, a registered investment advisor (RIA) and independent financial advisory firm, has launched the AdvisorShares Gerber Kawasaki ETF (GK), an actively managed ETF that uses Gerber Kawasaki’s proprietary and multi-thematic approach to capture growth in market segments ripe for disruption.

Gerber Kawasaki co-founder, President and CEO Ross Gerber, who has nearly three decades of investment management experience, is the portfolio manager of the ETF, which trades on the NYSE Arca and has a net expense ratio of 0.81%.

“Even as a large percentage of investors crave exposure to individual companies delivering transformational products and services across the globe, many of the current ETFs have a mindset rooted in the past, demonstrating what we believe is a limited understanding of how to capture the growth opportunities of tomorrow,” Gerber said in a statement. “Thanks to our approach and collective vision, this ETF will be much different.”

To make portfolio management more participatory, Gerber will welcome investor and analyst feedback via monthly Zoom meetings, inviting attendees to suggest positions and present new themes for his consideration.

“Our firm has always sought to make investing as easy as possible. This fund is consistent with that effort, seeking to give the retail investor of today who is doing a lot of their own trading exactly what they want — affordable and professionally managed access to companies shaping tomorrow’s biggest business and consumer trends,” Gerber said.

American Century Adds 3 Active ETFs

American Century Investments has added three more actively managed funds to its ETF lineup: the American Century Sustainable Growth ETF (ESGY), American Century Multisector Income ETF (MUSI) and American Century Emerging Markets Bond ETF (AEMB). All are listed on the NYSE Arca exchange.

ESGY is a risk-aware, large-cap growth fund that integrates ESG data in an effort to deliver competitive returns with a positive impact. Its portfolio management team aims for large-company growth stocks near the beginning of a cycle of improving earnings, increasing earnings estimates and expanding stock-price multiples.

The fund, which has a 0.39% expense ratio, is a semi-transparent ETF that will publish a proxy portfolio daily along with the level of overlap of its overlap with the fund’s actual portfolio. Its expense ratio is 0.39%.

MUSI is a fully transparent bond fund designed for investors pursuing consistent income in a tax-efficient ETF vehicle. The fund targets attractive yield while offering access to a diverse opportunity set of securities, including investment-grade corporate, high-yield corporate, emerging market debt and securitized bonds.

Sector allocation decisions are based on the global macro outlook, historical spreads and cross-sector valuations and are informed by American Century’s global macro strategy and sector specialist team views. Security selection is led by long-tenured sector specialists who apply fundamental, bottom-up analysis to assess relative value and creditworthiness. The ETF has a 0.35% expense ratio.

AEMB is designed for investors seeking enhanced emerging markets debt yield and diversification in a tax-efficient ETF wrapper. The fund seeks to provide a high level of current income and attractive risk-adjusted returns throughout the market cycle, using a fundamental approach.

It primarily invests in hard-currency debt issued by sovereign, quasi-sovereign and corporate entities in emerging markets, and its security selection process incorporates traditional credit analysis. The fund has a 0.39% expense ratio.

IndexIQ Launches New ESG Core Plus Bond ETF

IndexIQ has introduced the IQ MacKay ESG Core Plus Bond ETF (ESGB), which focuses on securities within the core bond universe that satisfy environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria developed by MacKay Shields (MacKay), a fellow New York Life Investments boutique and a global asset manager.

The ETF is actively managed and seeks total return across a broad portfolio of fixed-income securities, while incorporating MacKay’s ESG analysis framework. The portfolio prioritizes issuers that demonstrate strong performance relative to peers across certain ESG metrics.

ESGB invests at least 80% of its assets in debt securities including government bonds, corporate bonds, mortgage and other asset-backed securities, and could include fixed or floating rates of interest that meet MacKay’s proprietary ESG methodology standards. The targeted duration of the fund is within 2.5 years (plus or minus) of the duration of the Bloomberg Barclays U.S. Aggregate Bond Index.