iShares Leverages the Full Breadth of BlackRock’s Investment Platform to Expand Megatrend ETF Line-Up
BlackRock is expanding its Megatrend suite with four new ETFs to meet rising investor demand for innovative strategies. The active transparent ETFs include the BlackRock Future Health ETF (NYSE:BMED), BlackRock Future Tech ETF (NYSE:BTEK), and BlackRock Future Innovators ETF (NYSE:BFTR), targeting healthcare and tech innovation. Additionally, the iShares Virtual Work and Life Multisector ETF (NYSE:IWFH) aims to capture trends in remote working. Armando Senra noted that the megatrend category could grow 500% to $250 billion by 2024, reflecting shifting economic activities.
- BlackRock launches four new ETFs targeting healthcare and technology innovation, enhancing product offerings.
- Projected growth of megatrend category to $250 billion by 2024 indicates strong market potential.
- Experienced portfolio managers with a combined $80 billion AUM leading the new ETF strategies.
- None.
NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The structural shifts influencing the future of the global economy and society have accelerated in 2020, leading to increased investor demand for strategies that go beyond traditional sector, market capitalization and geographic classifications.
To help clients seek exposure to these transformative forces, BlackRock is expanding its Megatrend suite by introducing three active transparent exchange traded funds (ETFs) managed by experienced investors from BlackRock’s Fundamental Active Equity franchise and one index-tracking ETF. The funds are designed to provide unique exposure to technology and healthcare innovation.
Active Transparent ETFs:
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BlackRock Future Health ETF (NYSE:BMED): Provides access to innovative and emerging companies in the healthcare sector
- Lead Portfolio Manager: Erin Xie, PhD
- Reference Benchmark: MSCI All Country World Index (ACWI)
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BlackRock Future Tech ETF (NYSE:BTEK): Invests in companies developing innovative and emerging technologies in the technology sector
- Lead Portfolio Manager: Tony Kim
- Reference Benchmark: MSCI All Country World Index (ACWI)
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BlackRock Future Innovators ETF (NYSE:BFTR): Offers exposure to innovative companies across sectors in the small/mid cap growth category
- Lead Portfolio Manager: Phil Ruvinsky
- Reference Benchmark: Russell 2500 Growth
Index-Tracking ETF:
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iShares Virtual Work and Life Multisector ETF (NYSE:IWFH): Seeks to track an index of developed and emerging market companies that provide products, services and technologies that empower individuals to work remotely, and support an increasingly virtual way of life.
- Index: NYSE FactSet Global Virtual Work and Life Index
“Megatrends are driving the world’s economic, social and technological transformation, presenting tremendous investment opportunities and investor demand. We are still in the early days of growth for these funds. iShares projects that the megatrend category is projected to grow
Industry-Leading Alpha Seeking Expertise Accessible Through ETFs
BlackRock’s Active Equity platform delivers the combination of human insight with the power of the firm’s technology and risk platforms, along with the benefit of fundamental and quantitative global research and expertise in trading and market intelligence.
“The ability to innovate and capture disruption caused by innovation are critical to the success of active investors. Through these funds, our portfolio managers will be able to focus on secular changes disrupting our economy without being constrained by industries and sectors,” said Tony DeSpirito, Chief Investment Officer for Fundamental U.S. Active Equities, says “We are excited to leverage iShares’ infrastructure to deliver these funds as active transparent ETFs, a first for our team.”
The managers for BMED, BTEK and BFTR bring six decades of combined experience and demonstrated ability to generate alpha by deploying high conviction strategies informed by the evaluation of the financial prospects of companies, analysis of market behavior and exploitation of market trends. They are responsible for more than
Expanding Choice and Flexibility to Meet Client Needs
The launch of these four ETFs today are representative of the unique combination of capabilities and expertise in stock selection, ETF infrastructure, analytics and portfolio modeling that BlackRock leverages to deliver choice and flexibility to clients.
BlackRock’s commitment to helping clients build better financial futures is further represented through a commitment to launch active ETFs when the exposures are believed to add value for clients, have clear alpha potential and complement existing active and index ETFs and mutual funds.
“Because we offer a full spectrum of funds, we focus on delivering our capabilities in ways that seek to maximize the benefit to our clients. Today’s introduction of active and index ETFs is another example of that,” said Martin Small, Head of BlackRock's U.S. Wealth Advisory business. “In order to help our clients better navigate our offerings, our index-based strategies will continue to be branded as iShares funds, and our alpha-seeking ETFs will be branded as BlackRock funds, reflecting the firm’s history as a premier active investor.”
Comparing Index and Active ETFs
Traditional index ETFs seek to track an index, typically constructed by a third-party index-provider, and reallocate at a pre-determined time period (e.g. on a semi-annual or annual basis). Index ETFs publish holdings daily, and the goal of the fund is to deliver returns in-line with their stated benchmark.
Transparent active ETFs also publish holdings daily, but do not seek to track a specific index and have a stated objective of maximizing income, long-term capital appreciation or total return. Investment decisions are made by BlackRock active portfolio managers, who use their IP to make changes to holdings within the ETF in accordance with the fund’s objective– therefore, the frequency in which holdings change will vary.
About BlackRock’s Actively Managed ETFs
BlackRock’s preexisting lineup of actively managed ETFs includes:
- BlackRock U.S. Equity Factor Rotation ETF (DYNF)
- iShares Short Maturity Municipal Bond ETF (MEAR)
- iShares Short Maturity Bond ETF (NEAR)
About the Portfolio Managers:
Dr. Erin Xie has more than 15 years of experience as a lead portfolio manager. She earned a PhD in Biochemistry from UCLA and an MBA from MIT Sloan. Dr. Xie is the lead manager of the BlackRock Health Sciences Opportunities Portfolio (SHSSX) – the No. 1 rated mutual fund for risk-adjusted returns in the Morningstar Healthcare category over the past 15 years1, and manages
Tony Kim, portfolio manager for the BlackRock Technology Opportunities Fund (BGSIX), is the only Morningstar gold rated portfolio manager in his category2. He has covered the tech sector for more than two decades. He is responsible for managing
Phil Ruvinsky is a senior portfolio manager for three funds (CMGIX, MAFOX and MAFGX) with
About BlackRock
BlackRock’s purpose is to help more and more people experience financial well-being. As a fiduciary to investors and a leading provider of financial technology, our clients turn to us for the solutions they need when planning for their most important goals. As of June 30, 2020, the firm managed approximately
About iShares
iShares unlocks opportunity across markets to meet the evolving needs of investors. With more than twenty years of experience, a global line-up of 900+ exchange traded funds (ETFs) and
1 Based on
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1 Morningstar as of 8/31/20. Ranking based on total returns. Ranked against 70 funds on the 15-year horizon. 19 of 118 funds on the 1-year, 2 of 102 funds on the 3-year, 2 of 97 funds on the 5-year, and 1 of 86 funds on the 10-year. Universe is ETFs and mutual funds in the Morningstar category. Past performance does not guarantee future results. (AUM Source: BlackRock, as of 8/31/20)
2 Morningstar as at September 28th 2020. Morningstar peer group: US OE Technology
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