Companies have spun off departments as a popular way to unlock shareholder value, potentially creating more focused and higher quality brands. Investors can also tap into this segment of the market specialized exchange traded funds.
Spin-off stocks have been among the best performing areas of 2016. Year-to-date, the Guggenheim Spin-Off ETF (NYSEArca: CSD) rose 16.0% and VanEck Vectors Global Spin-Off ETF (NYSEArca: SPUN) increased 23.9%.
The two strategies have outperformed the broader market, with the S&P 500 index up 12.1% this year, as
CSD tracks the S&P U.S. Broad Market Index, which contains all spin-off added to the S&P U.S. BMI that have a float-adjusted market cap of at least $1 billion.
Top holdings include Synchrony Financial 8.2%, Hewlett Packard 7.7%, Zoetis 7.4%, PayPal 7.2% and Abbvie 7.0%. Top sector weights include a hefty 24.3% tilt toward information technology, followed by 17.8% healthcare and 14.4% consumer discretionary.
Unlike CSD, the competing SPUN targets global spin-offs through the Horizon Kinetics Global Spin-Off Index, a rules-based, equal-weighted index that tracks publicly held spin-offs domiciled and traded in the U.S. or developed markets of Western Europe and Asia. Country weights include a large 81.1% position in U.S., along with China 3.8%, Australia 2.4%, Finland 2.4% and U.K. 2.1%, among others.