Designed to provide broad exposure to the Style Box – Large Cap Value category of the market, the Invesco FTSE RAFI US 1000 ETF (PRF) is a smart beta exchange traded fund launched on 12/19/2005.
What Are Smart Beta ETFs?
Products that are based on market cap weighted indexes, which are strategies designed to reflect a specific market segment or the market as a whole, have traditionally dominated the ETF industry.
Market cap weighted indexes work great for investors who believe in market efficiency. They provide a low-cost, convenient and transparent way of replicating market returns.
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.
By attempting to pick stocks that have a better chance of risk-return performance, non-cap weighted indexes are based on certain fundamental characteristics, or a combination of such.
While this space offers a number of choices to investors, including simplest equal-weighting, fundamental weighting and volatility/momentum based weighting methodologies, not all these strategies have been able to deliver superior results.
Fund Sponsor & Index
Because the fund has amassed over $5.77 billion, this makes it one of the average sized ETFs in the Style Box – Large Cap Value. PRF is managed by Invesco. PRF seeks to match the performance of the FTSE RAFI US 1000 Index before fees and expenses.
The FTSE RAFI US 1000 Index is designed to track the performance of the largest U.S. equities, selected based on the following four fundamental measures of firm size: book value, income, sales and dividends. U.S. equities are then weighted by each of these four fundamental measures.An overall weight is calculated for each firm by equally-weighting each fundamental measure.
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.
With on par with most peer products in the space, this ETF has annual operating expenses of 0.39%.
It’s 12-month trailing dividend yield comes in at 1.64%.
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.
This ETF has heaviest allocation in the Financials sector – about 19.20% of the portfolio. Information Technology and Healthcare round out the top three.
Taking into account individual holdings, Apple Inc (AAPL) accounts for about 2.36% of the fund’s total assets, followed by Microsoft Corp (MSFT) and Jpmorgan Chase & Co (JPM).
PRF’s top 10 holdings account for about 16.86% of its total assets under management.
Performance and Risk
The ETF has lost about -4.63% so far this year and is up roughly 10.64% in the last one year (as of 03/11/2022). In the past 52-week period, it has traded between $148.01 and $175.48.
The fund has a beta of 1.03 and standard deviation of 23.88% for the trailing three-year period, which makes PRF a medium risk choice in this particular space. With about 1001 holdings, it effectively diversifies company-specific risk.
Alternatives
Invesco FTSE RAFI US 1000 ETF is a reasonable option for investors seeking to outperform the Style Box – Large Cap Value segment of the market. However, there are other ETFs in the space which investors could consider.
IShares Russell 1000 Value ETF (IWD) tracks Russell 1000 Value Index and the Vanguard Value ETF (VTV) tracks CRSP U.S. Large Cap Value Index. IShares Russell 1000 Value ETF has $56.11 billion in assets, Vanguard Value ETF has $92.15 billion. IWD has an expense ratio of 0.19% and VTV charges 0.04%.
Investors looking for cheaper and lower-risk options should consider traditional market cap weighted ETFs that aim to match the returns of the Style Box – Large Cap Value.
Bottom Line
To learn more about this product and other ETFs, screen for products that match your investment objectives and read articles on latest developments in the ETF investing universe, please visit
Zacks ETF Center
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