Advisors and investors are hearing plenty about the growth of smart or strategic beta exchange-traded funds. New data confirm these ETFs, which toe the line between active and passive management, are growing at a blistering pace.
A recent survey by Create-Research found that smart beta ETFs account for over $300 billion, or 18 percent of the U.S. ETF market, by far the largest ETF market in the world.
Strategic, Smart Beta ETFs
Excluding two currency hedged ETFs – WisdomTree Inter Hedged Eq Fund (NYSE: HEDJ) and the DBX ETF Trust (NYSE: DBEF) – the rest of this year's top asset-gathering equity ETFs are cap-weighted funds. However, there are plenty of examples of factor-based and smart beta ETFs packing on the assets.
Factor-Based, Smart Beta ETFs
“Products which are categorised as smart beta based only on the fact that the index uses an alternative weighting methodology have $22.7 billion assets across 84 products, while those utilising volatility screens such as filtering for securities with low volatility have 63 products and $26.4 billion assets. There were also 28 products based on momentum strategies with $10.6 billion assets,” according to ETFGI.
WisdomTree Investments, Inc. (NASDAQ: WETF) is the top asset gatherer among smart issuers year-to-date, followed by iShares, the world's largest issuer of ETFs.
The author owns shares of DGRW.
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