inefficiencies created by irrational investor behavior, such as investment decisions driven by emotions, biases, or cognitive errors. To identify these investment opportunities, the Fund employs a disciplined, bottom-up investment process highlighted by rigorous, internally-generated fundamental research. With the exception of diversification guidelines, the Fund does not employ predetermined rules for sales; rather, the Fund evaluates each sell candidate based on the candidate’s specific risk and return characteristics which include: 1) relative valuation; 2) fundamental operating trends; 3) deterioration of fundamentals; and 4) portfolio diversification. Relative valuation involves selling an investment when a company’s valuation metrics become high relative to comparable companies, the market, or its historical levels. Fundamental operating trends involves selling an investment when there is evidence of a decline in a company’s underlying business performance or industry conditions. Deterioration of fundamentals involves selling an investment when a company’s underlying business or industry fundamentals, such as revenue or earnings, weaken. Portfolio diversification refers to selling holdings to maintain balance, manage risk, and optimize returns.
As of the date of this Prospectus, the top sector represented by the Fund’s underlying investments was financials. The Fund’s investments in various sectors may change over time.
Principal Investment Risks. As with any ETF, the value of the Fund’s investments, and therefore the value of its shares, may go down and you could lose all or a portion of your investment in the Fund. Many factors can affect those values. The factors that are most likely to have a material effect on the Fund’s portfolio as a whole are called “principal risks.” The principal risks of investing in the Fund are described in this section.
Market Risk. Market risk is the risk that the market price of securities owned by the Fund may go down, sometimes rapidly or unpredictably, due to factors affecting securities markets generally or particular industries represented in the securities markets. These factors include general domestic or foreign economic, political or financial market conditions, rates of economic growth and employment, trade and monetary policy, interest rates, inflation, and currency rates. Natural disasters, public health emergencies (including pandemics and epidemics), global conflict and war, military conflict, climate change, terrorism and other unforeseeable events that adversely affect individual companies, industries, sectors, and/or segments of the market, may lead to instability in world economies and markets and may have negative long-term effects. Any of such factors could have a materially negative impact on the value of the Fund’s shares or the liquidity of an investment and may result in increased market volatility. Financial markets also may be adversely affected by concerns regarding government debt levels, fiscal deficits, sovereign borrowing needs, and the sustainability of fiscal policies, which may contribute to increased interest rates, market volatility, reduced liquidity, or changes in investor sentiment. During any such events, the Fund’s shares may trade at increased premiums or discounts to their net asset value (“NAV”), the bid/ask spread on the Fund’s shares may widen and the returns on investment may fluctuate.
Style Risk. The Advisor follows an investing style that favors value investments. Value investing style may over time go in and out of favor in certain market cycles. At times when the value investing style is out of
favor, the Fund's performance may be negatively impacted. Investors should be prepared to tolerate volatility in Fund returns.
Equity Securities Risk. Equity securities, both common and preferred stocks, have greater price volatility than fixed income securities. The market price of equity securities owned by the Fund may go down, sometimes rapidly or unpredictably. Equity securities may decline in value due to factors affecting the issuer, equity securities markets or particular industries represented by those markets, including poor management on the part of the stock’s issuer, shrinking product demand and other business risks, such as rapid technological developments or widespread adoption of emerging technologies (such as artificial intelligence).
Capitalization Risk. Investment in small and mid-cap companies may involve more risk than investing in larger, more established companies. Small and mid-cap companies may have limited product lines or markets. They may be less financially secure than larger, more established companies. They may depend on a small number of key personnel. Should a product fail, or if management changes, or if there are other adverse developments, the Fund’s investment in a small or mid-cap company may lose substantial value. In addition, small and mid-cap companies may be particularly affected by interest rate increases, as they may find it more difficult to borrow money to continue or expand operations, or may have difficulty in repaying any loans.
Active Management Risk. The Fund is subject to active management risk because it is an actively managed investment portfolio. The Advisor invests in securities that may not necessarily be included in the Fund’s benchmark. The Advisor may misjudge the risk and/or return potential of a security. This misjudgment can result in a loss or a significant performance deviation relative to its benchmarks. The Advisor does not seek to replicate the performance of any index.
Financials Sector Risk. As of the date of this Prospectus, the Fund currently invests a significant portion of its assets in companies in the financials sector, and therefore the performance of the Fund could be negatively impacted by events affecting this sector. This sector can be significantly affected by changes in interest rates, the rate of corporate and consumer debt defaults, the availability and cost of borrowing and raising capital, reduced credit market liquidity, regulatory changes, price competition, bank failures and other financial crises, and general economic and market conditions. Changing interest rates could reduce the profitability of certain types of companies in the financials sector. Financial companies may have concentrated portfolios, such as a high level of loans to one or more industries or sectors, which makes them vulnerable to economic conditions that affect such industries or sectors. Significant events may have a negative impact on economies and financial markets worldwide, resulting in higher debt defaults, loan write-offs, and government intervention, and potentially the failure of some financial institutions, each of which would reduce investment performance of financials sector companies held by the Fund.
Issuer Risk. The value of a security may decline for a number of reasons which directly relate to the issuer, such as management performance,