A sound investment process and strong management team underpin BlackRock Short-Term CA Muni Bd ETF's Morningstar Medalist Rating of Bronze. The portfolio maintains a sizable cost advantage over competitors, priced within the cheapest fee quintile among peers.  

 The strategy's effective investment philosophy earns it an Above Average Process Pillar rating. The management team's considerable industry experience earns it an Above Average People Pillar rating. The strategy's parent organization earns the firm an Above Average Parent Pillar rating, and this rating is inherited from vehicles belonging to the same branding entity and is indirectly assigned by an analyst.

Analyst Rating

Morningstar's evaluation of this fund's process seeks to understand management's investment philosophy, and whether it has been applied consistently over time and can add value across the market cycle. BlackRock Short-Term CA Muni Bd ETF earns an Above Average Process Pillar rating.    The leading factor in the rating is the parent firm's five-year risk-adjusted success ratio of 58%. The measure indicates the percentage of a firm's funds that survived and outperformed their respective category's median Morningstar Risk-Adjusted Return for the period. The parent firm's impressive risk-adjusted performance, as shown by its average 10-year Morningstar Rating of 3.2 stars, also supports the rating. Lastly, the process is limited by the parent firm's five-year retention rate of 80%, which suggests it could do more to hold onto its portfolio managers.

 The investment strategy as stated in the fund's prospectus is as follows: 


The investment seeks to maximize tax‑free current income by investing in short-term municipal bonds issued in the State of California.  Under normal circumstances, the fund will primarily invest in U.S. dollar-denominated investment-grade short-term fixed- and floating-rate municipal securities issued by California with remaining maturities of five years or less, such as municipal bonds, municipal notes and variable rate demand obligations, and as well as money market instruments and registered investment companies. The fund is non-diversified.

Above Average

Process

BlackRock Short-Term CA Muni Bd ETF earns an Above Average People Pillar rating. The main contributor to the rating is its parent firm's five-year success ratio of 59%. The measure indicates the percentage of a firm's funds that survived and outperformed their respective category's median return for the period. The rating is limited because none of the managers have over $1 million invested in the fund, which would show confidence in the strategy.


Christian G. Romaglino’s veteran status, with 22 years of listed portfolio management experience, brings a wealth of experience to the table. The average Morningstar Rating of the strategies they currently manage is 3.3 stars, demonstrating average risk-adjusted performance. Christian G. Romaglino has an experienced backdrop of support. The three listed managers boast 10 years of average listed portfolio management experience.

People

BlackRock offers compelling options across asset classes and vehicles. It earns an Above Average rating for Parent. 
The firm’s approximately USD 8 trillion in assets under management, as of Sept. 30, 2022, gives it unparalleled scale and influence. It is a market-leading index fund provider globally, and its iShares exchange-traded fund franchise offers a low-cost lineup of core funds that investors can use to build a well-diversified portfolio for dirt cheap. The firm can be more adventurous in its ETF launches than some peers, so not everything it launches is appropriate for the masses. As a result, it is likely to have more ETF closures than peers that stick to the basic building blocks.  
The firm’s active fixed-income and multi-asset efforts also stand out as some of the best in the industry. Those benefit from BlackRock’s commitment to building a first-class risk management system via its Aladdin analytics software. The software is also available for sale to other firms and has proved to be a popular option for competitors, a testament to its usefulness. 
More recently, the firm has shifted its focus to ESG offerings and incorporating ESG across its investment lineup, leading to a political backlash in the United States.
BlackRock isn’t the best at everything it tries to do, but retail investors, financial advisors, and large institutions could all build robust portfolios using BlackRock’s products.

Parent

Blackrock Short-Term California Muni Bond

CALY is an actively managed fund that primarily invests in municipal securities exempt from federal income taxes. It will hold short-term, investment grade Muni bonds issued in California while aiming for an effective portfolio duration equal to or less than 1.5 years.

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News for Blackrock Short-Term California Muni Bond ETF (CALY)