A Look At The "Other" Australia ETF

In the world of Australia-specific equity ETFs, there is a king: The iShares MSCI Australia Index Fund

. There is a prince: The IQ Australia Small Cap ETF

. And there is another member of the court: The little-known WisdomTree Australia Dividend ETF (NYSE AUSE). Now two weeks removed from its fifth birthday, AUSE has $53.8 million in assets under management, two stats that are easily surpassed by EWA's 0.53% expense ratio and its $3.23 billion in AUM. And while this isn't an “ETF Showdown,” there are some important differences between these two ETFs and they actually show that AUSE's anonymous is undeserved. EWA is a two-trick pony as financials and materials account for over 70% of the ETF's weight. Sure, the materials theme is important to Australia's economy, but this is a developed market we're talking about. There's more than just miners and banks driving Australia's economy. AUSE captures that notion with just a 9.1% weight to materials stocks, meaning the sector is just AUSE's fifth-largest industry weight. Financials, consumer staples, consumer discretionary and industrials all get double-digit representation in AUSE. In other words, AUSE takes a different approach to Australia's economy. The sector weights indicate as much as does the fact that BHP Billiton

and Rio Tinto

, two of three largest mining companies in the world, account for less than 2% COMBINED of AUSE. On its own, BHP accounts for nearly 15.2% of EWA's weight. Sector and stock diversity are just two reasons to consider AUSE for your Australian needs. Yield is another. EWA's yield isn't bad at 3.12%, but AUSE's yield is stellar at 5.9%. And since both funds have moved in lock-step with each other year-to-date, that difference in yield makes AUSE worth a look.