Alphabet ETFs

Vanguard is expanding its ETF lineup with the introduction of the AlphaBet series of ETFs, an innovation in the ever-growing ETF space. Together these 26 portfolios, based on the initial letter of the ticker symbol of each company in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index, provide investors with U.S. equity market beta building blocks by covering the index from A to Z.

Because of the transparent, rules-based nature of the portfolios—constructed with equal-weighted components of all current securities in the S&P 500 whose tickers begin with a particular letter of the alphabet and rebalanced monthly—we have been able to model the historical performance of these portfolios over time to assist investors in understanding how these portfolios may perform. Some observations and strategies:  Each of the 26 portfolios outperformed the overall S&P 500 Index.