Fixed income markets: Economic and other market developments can adversely affect the fixed income securities markets. At times, participants in these markets may develop concerns about the ability of certain issuers of debt instruments to make timely principal and interest payments, or they may develop concerns about the ability of financial institutions that make markets in certain debt instruments to facilitate an orderly market. Those concerns could cause increased volatility and reduced liquidity in particular securities or in the overall fixed income markets and the related derivatives markets. A lack of liquidity or other adverse credit market conditions may hamper the fund’s ability to sell the debt instruments in which it invests or to find and purchase suitable debt instruments.

Market conditions: The value of the fund’s investments may decrease, sometimes rapidly or unexpectedly, due to factors affecting an issuer held by the fund, particular industries, or the overall securities markets. A variety of factors can increase the volatility of the fund’s holdings and markets generally, including geopolitical developments (such as trade and tariff arrangements, sanctions, and cybersecurity attacks), recessions, inflation, rapid interest rate changes, war, military conflict, acts of terrorism, natural disasters, and outbreaks of infectious illnesses or other widespread public health issues (such as pandemics) and related governmental and public responses. Certain events may cause instability across global markets, including reduced liquidity and disruptions in trading markets, while some events may affect certain geographic regions, countries, sectors, and industries more significantly than others. Government intervention in markets may impact interest rates, market volatility, and security pricing. These adverse developments may cause broad declines in market value due to short-term market movements or for significantly longer periods during more prolonged market downturns.

Tracking error: The fund’s attempt to achieve an incremental return above the index could result in a greater chance of tracking error when compared with a fund that strictly follows a passive indexing strategy. Index funds are generally subject to the risk that their returns will be slightly below the returns of the index they are designed to track (referred to as “tracking error”) because the funds incur fees and transaction expenses while an index has no fees or expenses. The fund may experience tracking error due to changes in the composition of the index or the timing of purchases and redemptions of fund shares, or because it does not attempt to fully replicate the index. In addition, relying on quantitative models entails the risk that the models may be limited or incorrect, the data on which the models rely may be incorrect or incomplete, or the models may not be implemented as intended by the adviser, all of which could increase the fund’s tracking error.

Derivatives: The use of derivatives exposes the fund to additional volatility and potential losses and the fund may not achieve the purpose of using the derivative. A derivative involves risks different from, and possibly greater than, the risks associated with investing directly in the reference or assets on which the derivative is based, including liquidity risk, valuation risk, correlation risk, market risk, interest rate risk, leverage risk, counterparty and credit risk, operational risk, management risk, legal risk, and regulatory risk. Derivatives can be highly volatile, illiquid, and difficult to value, and changes in the value of a derivative may not properly correlate with changes in the value of the underlying asset, reference rate, or index. The fund could be exposed to significant losses if it is unable to close a derivatives position due to the lack of a liquid secondary trading market. The prices of derivatives may move in unexpected ways, especially in abnormal market conditions. Derivatives also expose the fund to settlement risk, such as if the fund is required to acquire, buy, or sell the underlying reference or asset at an undesirable price, has challenges with offsetting transactions, or risks associated with cash settlement. Certain derivatives are also subject to counterparty risk, which is the risk that the derivative counterparty will not fulfill its contractual obligations. The use of derivatives includes the risk of potential operational issues. Derivatives are exposed to legal risks, such as the legality or enforceability of a contract. The adviser may not be able to accurately predict the direction of prices, economic factors, or other associated risks which could cause loss in value or impair the fund’s efforts to reduce overall volatility. New regulations may make derivatives more costly, limit availability, or otherwise affect their value or performance.

Liquidity: The fund may not be able to meet requests to redeem shares issued by the fund without significant dilution of the remaining shareholders’ interests in the fund. In addition, the fund may not be able to sell a holding in a timely manner at a desired price. Reduced liquidity in the bond markets can result from a number of events, such as limited trading activity, reductions in bond inventory, and rapid or unexpected changes in interest rates. Markets with lower overall liquidity could lead to greater price volatility and limit the fund’s ability to sell a holding at a suitable price.