A sound investment process and strong management team underpin iShares Expanded Tech Sector ETF's Morningstar Medalist Rating of Silver. The portfolio maintains a sizable cost advantage over competitors, priced within the least expensive fee quintile among peers.  

 The strategy's investment process inspires confidence and earns an Above Average Process Pillar rating. Independent of the rating, analysis of the strategy's portfolio shows it has maintained an underweight position in liquidity exposure and volatility exposure compared with category peers. Low liquidity risk exposure is attributed to stocks with a low trading volume, limiting managers' flexibility. And low volatility exposure is rooted in stocks that have a lower standard deviation of returns. The strategy’s management team earns an Above Average People Pillar rating. The strategy's parent organization earns the firm an Above Average Parent Pillar rating. People Pillar and Parent Pillar ratings for this strategy are indirectly assigned by a Morningstar analyst rather than algorithmically derived. Please see the notes following each pillar section for more details. The details of assigning methods can be found in each pillar section.

Analyst Rating

Apple

Microsoft

NVIDIA

Alphabet

Broadcom

salesforce.com

Advanced Micro Devices

Netflix

Morningstar's evaluation of this security's process aims to determine the likelihood that it will outperform its Morningstar Category benchmark on a risk-adjusted basis over the long term. iShares Expanded Tech Sector ETF earns an Above Average Process Pillar rating. The predominant contributor to the rating is that this fund tracks an index. Historical data, like Morningstar's Active/Passive Barometer, finds that passively managed funds have generally outperformed their active counterparts, especially over longer time horizons. The process is limited by the fund's mediocre long-term risk-adjusted performance. This can be seen in its five-year alpha calculated relative to the category index, which suggests that the process has struggled over that period.

The investment strategy as stated in the fund's prospectus is:  The investment seeks to track the investment results of an index composed of North American equities in the technology sector and select North American equities from communication services and consumer discretionary sectors.  The fund generally will invest at least 80% of its assets in the component securities of its underlying index and in investments that have economic characteristics that are substantially identical to the component securities of its underlying index. A significant portion of the underlying index is represented by securities of companies in the technology industry or sector. It is non-diversified. 

 The portfolio is overweight in communication services by 10.2 percentage points in terms of assets compared with the category average, and its technology allocation is similar to the category. The sectors with low exposure compared to category peers are consumer cyclical and industrials, underweight the average by 4.4 and 2.8 percentage points of assets, respectively. The portfolio is positioned across 285 holdings and is relatively concentrated. In particular, 54.7% of the strategy's assets are housed within the top 10 holdings, as opposed to the typical peer's 52.3%. And finally, in terms of portfolio turnover, on a year-over-year basis, 9% of the fund's holdings have turned over, whether through increasing, decreasing, or changing a position.

Above Average

Process

iShares Expanded Tech Sector ETF benefits considerably from its equity team, earning it an Above Average People Pillar rating. There are three managers listed on the fund: Paul Whitehead, Jennifer Hsui, Greg Savage. The team is well equipped, with an average of 18 years of portfolio management experience. Together, they manage a total of 257 strategies, with a Silver asset-weighted average Morningstar Medalist Rating, demonstrating their potential to deliver positive alpha relative to the category median in aggregate.  

 Note: This People Pillar rating is indirectly assigned by an analyst. Morningstar analysts evaluate the People Pillar for passive products at the brand level and may also differentiate by asset class. There is at least one other passive strategy at the firm that is covered by a Morningstar analyst, so the People Pillar rating of the fund is inherited from the rating that the Morningstar analyst assigned to investment vehicles under the same brand name.

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

iShares North American Tech ETF

IGM tracks a market-cap-weighted index of US and Canadian technology companies.

Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) can be a great way to invest in certain segments of the stock market. Owning a cross-section of the tech sector will become increasingly important with the rise of AI.

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Launched on 03/13/2001, the iShares Expanded Tech Sector ETF (IGM) is a passively managed exchange traded fund designed to provide a broad exposure to the Technology - Broad segment of the equity market.

Should You Invest in the iShares Expanded Tech Sector ETF (IGM)?

Goldman Sachs forecasts rising margins for the Information Technology and Communication Services sectors, potentially driving the S&P 500 higher in 2024. The iShares Expanded Tech Sector ETF faces concentration risk due to its largest holding, Nvidia, potentially underperforming given a high bar ahead of its earnings report Wednesday night. IGM has a high allocation to large-cap growth stocks and a strong seasonal trend, but a correction may be in the works based on technical indicators.

IGM: Expanded Tech Margins In Focus, Price Action Is Stretched

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Hello! This is MarketWatch reporter Isabel Wang bringing you this week's ETF Wrap. After a decade of seemingly never-ending fee-cutting wars, ETF issuers raised their fees in 2023 as the landscape evolved beyond cheap index-tracking funds.

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iShares Expanded Tech Sector ETF provides access to technology stocks, including the Magnificent 7, at a relatively cheap price. The GICS reclassification in 2018 broadened the Communication Services sector to include technology companies like Alphabet and Meta Platforms. Valuation is not a reason to sell technology stocks, as they have strong quality characteristics and are in a strong uptrend.

IGM: The Real (And Magnificent) Technology ETF

For investors seeking momentum, iShares Expanded Tech Sector ETF IGM is probably on radar. The fund just hit a 52-week high and is up 56% from its 52-week low price of $272.47/share.

Technology ETF (IGM) Hits New 52-Week High

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Technology stocks have performed well in 2023, but there may be more volatility ahead. The iShares Expanded Tech Sector ETF has had a strong rally in 2023, but its valuation is high. The Federal Reserve's tightening monetary policy and declining liquidity pose downside risks for IGM and the technology sector.

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I rate IGM a Buy. The fund primarily invests in Big Tech and mid-cap tech stocks, making it an attractive investment option. Despite higher expenses and lower returns compared to QQQ, IGM has shown comparable performance and has gradually added more weight to promising stocks, such as NVIDIA. Although concentration in Big Tech may subject the fund to greater volatility, strong performance and resilience of stocks like Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, and Alphabet contribute to IGM's growth.

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IGM Financial Inc. (OTCPK:IGIFF) Q3 2022 Earnings Conference Call November 4, 2022 8:00 AM ET Company Participants Kyle Martens – Treasurer and Head of Investor Relations James O'Sullivan – President and Chief Executive Officer-IGM Financial Damon Murchison – President and Chief Executive Officer-IG Wealth Management Luke Gould – President and Chief Executive Officer-Mackenzie Investments Keith Potter – Executive Vice-President and Chief Financial Officer Conference Call Participants Nick Priebe – CIBC Capital Markets Geoff Kwan – RBC Capital Markets Scott Chan – Canaccord Genuity Graham Ryding – TD Securities James Shanahan – Edward Jones Jaeme Gloyn – National Bank Financial Operator Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator.

IGM Financial Inc. (IGIFF) Q3 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

IGM is named well: it contains tech exposures, just more of them, with more weighting towards smaller names. The IVW goes less deep, and is more exposed to tech big cap stocks which have more enterprise focused businesses.

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IGM Financial Inc. (OTCPK:IGIFF) Q2 2022 Earnings Conference Call August 5, 2022 8:00 AM ET Company Participants Kyle Martens – Treasurer and Head-Investor Relations James O'Sullivan – President and Chief Executive Officer Damon Murchison – President and Chief Executive Officer-IG Wealth Management Luke Gould – President and Chief Executive Officer-Mackenzie Investments Keith Potter – Executive Vice-President and Chief Financial Officer Conference Call Participants Geoff Kwan – RBC Capital Markets Nik Priebe – CIBC Capital Markets Scott Chan – Canaccord Genuity Graham Ryding – TD Securities Jaeme Gloyn – National Bank Financial James Shanahan – Edward Jones Operator Welcome to the IGM Financial Q2 2022 Analyst Call and Webcast. As a reminder all participants are in listen-only mode.

IGM Financial Inc. (IGIFF) CEO James O'Sullivan on Q2 2022 Results - Earnings Call Transcript

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