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Is Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight Health Care ETF (RYH) a Strong ETF Right Now?

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The Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight Health Care ETF was launched on 11/01/2006, and is a smart beta exchange traded fund designed to offer broad exposure to the Health Care ETFs category of the market.

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 offer a low-cost, convenient, and transparent way of replicating market returns, and are a good option for investors who believe in market efficiency.

But, there are some investors who would rather invest in smart beta funds; these funds track non-cap weighted strategies, and are a strong option for those who prefer choosing great stocks in order to beat the market.

This kind of index follows this same mindset, as it attempts to pick stocks that have better chances of risk-return performance; non-cap weighted strategies base selection on certain fundamental characteristics, or a mix of such characteristics.

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

The fund is managed by Invesco, and has been able to amass over $862.88 million, which makes it one of the larger ETFs in the Health Care ETFs. This particular fund, before fees and expenses, seeks to match the performance of the S&P 500 Equal Weight Health Care Index.

The S&P 500 Equal Weight Health Care Index equally weights stocks in the health care sector of the S&P 500 Index.

Cost & Other Expenses

Since cheaper funds tend to produce better results than more expensive funds, assuming all other factors remain equal, it is important for investors to pay attention to an ETF's expense ratio.

Operating expenses on an annual basis are 0.40% for this ETF, which makes it on par with most peer products in the space.

It has a 12-month trailing dividend yield of 0.73%.

Sector Exposure and Top Holdings

It is important to delve into an ETF's holdings before investing despite the many upsides to these kinds of funds like diversified exposure, which minimizes single stock risk. And, most ETFs are very transparent products that disclose their holdings on a daily basis.

For RYH, it has heaviest allocation in the Healthcare sector --about 100% of the portfolio.

Looking at individual holdings, Organon & Co (OGN - Free Report) accounts for about 2.11% of total assets, followed by Cerner Corp and Bristol-Myers Squibb Co (BMY - Free Report) .

The top 10 holdings account for about 18.82% of total assets under management.

Performance and Risk

The ETF has lost about -15.10% so far this year and is down about -9.22% in the last one year (as of 07/14/2022). In the past 52-week period, it has traded between $254.10 and $321.86.

The fund has a beta of 0.88 and standard deviation of 22.29% for the trailing three-year period, which makes RYH a medium risk choice in this particular space. With about 66 holdings, it effectively diversifies company-specific risk.

Alternatives

Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight Health Care ETF is a reasonable option for investors seeking to outperform the Health Care ETFs segment of the market. However, there are other ETFs in the space which investors could consider.

Vanguard Health Care ETF (VHT - Free Report) tracks MSCI US Investable Market Health Care 25/50 Index and the Health Care Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLV - Free Report) tracks Health Care Select Sector Index. Vanguard Health Care ETF has $15.47 billion in assets, Health Care Select Sector SPDR ETF has $37.62 billion. VHT has an expense ratio of 0.10% and XLV charges 0.10%.

Investors looking for cheaper and lower-risk options should consider traditional market cap weighted ETFs that aim to match the returns of the Health Care ETFs.

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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