J.P. Morgan Expands BetaBuilders ETF Suite with Canada, Asia-Pacific | ETF Trends

J.P. Morgan Asset Management expanded on its lineup of low-cost, plain-vanilla market cap-weighted exchange traded funds under its BetaBuilders suite with two more options to help investors gain exposure to Asia Pacific and Canada markets.

J.P. Morgan rolled out the JPMorgan BetaBuilders Developed Asia-ex Japan ETF (Cboe: BBAX) and the JPMorgan BetaBuilders Canada ETF (Cboe: BBCA), which both have a 0.19% expense ratio.

The suite of so-called BetaBuilders are intended to help investors gain simple and easy access to broad equity markets, including many foreign country stocks.

Beta, A Measure of Volatility

Beta is a measure of the volatility of a security or a portfolio relative to a market benchmark. The term ‘BetaBuilders’ in the Fund’s name conveys the intended outcome of providing investors with passive exposure and return that generally correspond to a market cap weighted benchmark. The Fund, along with other JPMorgan BetaBuilders Funds, can be used to help an investor build a portfolio of passive exposure to various markets,” according to J.P. Morgan.

The JPMorgan BetaBuilders Developed Asia-ex Japan ETF will try to reflect the performance of the Morningstar Developed Asia Pacific ex-Japan Target Market Exposure Index, which is comprised of equity securities from developed Asia-Pacific countries or regions other than Japan, including Australia, Hong Kong New Zealand and Singapore, according to the fund’s prospectus.

Top holdings include AIA Group 6.0%, Commonwealth Bank of Australia 5.5%, BHP Billiton 4.6%, Westpac Banking 4.3% and CSL Ltd 3.9%.

Sector weights include Consumer Discretionary 5.8%, Consumer Staples 6.2%, Energy 3.1%, Financials 37.3%, Health Care 5.8%, Industrials 8.7%, Information Technology 0.8%, Materials 10.9%, Other 0.4%, Real Estate 13.1%, Telecommunication Services 2.3% and Utilities 4.9%.