The combination of an Average People Pillar rating and a Low Process Pillar rating limit  Franklin US Core Dividend Tilt Index ETF to a Morningstar Medalist Rating of Negative.  The portfolio maintains a cost advantage over competitors, priced within the least expensive fee quintile among peers.  

 The strategy receives a Low Process Pillar rating. Independent of the rating, analysis of the strategy's portfolio shows it has maintained an overweight in liquidity exposure and yield exposure compared with category peers. High liquidity exposure is attributed to stocks with a high trading volume, lending managers more flexibility. And a high yield exposure is rooted in holding high dividend-paying or buyback stocks. The strategy’s management team earns an Average People Pillar rating. The strategy's parent organization earns the firm an 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

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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. Franklin US Core Dividend Tilt Index ETF earns a Low Process Pillar rating. 

The main driver of the rating is the fund's unimpressive 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 parent firm's disappointing risk-adjusted performance, as shown by its average 10-year Morningstar Rating of 2.5 stars, also weakens the process. A lower star rating suggests that the firm has struggled to outperform on a risk-adjusted basis. The parent firm's five-year risk-adjusted success ratio of 37% further holds the rating back. 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's relatively low success ratio suggests that the firm could do better across its fund lineup.

 This strategy tends to hold smaller, more value-oriented companies than its average peer in the Large Blend Morningstar Category. Analyzing additional factors, this strategy has consistently tilted toward companies with relatively higher trading volumes in the last few years. This gives the managers more flexibility during bear markets to sell without adversely affecting prices. In recent months, the strategy was more exposed to the Liquidity factor compared with its Morningstar Category peers as well. The managers have also tended to overweight yield during recent years, shown by the portfolio's high exposure to dividends or buybacks. Higher-yield stocks can provide dependable income, but also have their risks. Dividend payers may cut payouts, for instance, if their earnings fall. Compared with category peers, the strategy also had more exposure to the Yield factor in the most recent month. In addition, this strategy has not maintained a defensive tilt, demonstrated by low exposure to the quality factor. This means the fund avoids holding firms that are consistently profitable, growing, and have solid balance sheets. Such positions do not tend to provide much ballast for a portfolio. In recent months, the strategy also had less Quality factor exposure than its peers. More information on a fund and its respective category's factor exposure can be found in the Factor Profile module within the Portfolio section. 

 The portfolio is overweight in technology and real estate relative to the category average by 5.4 and 2.9 percentage points, respectively. The sectors with low exposure compared to category peers are industrials and healthcare, with industrials underweighting the average portfolio by 5.0 percentage points of assets and healthcare similar to the average. The portfolio is positioned across 285 holdings and is less top-heavy than peers. Specifically, 31.5% of the portfolio's assets are concentrated within the top 10 fund holdings, as opposed to the category’s 49.5% average.

Process

Franklin Templeton’s  team is comparable to peers, resulting in an Average People Pillar rating. There are four managers listed on the fund: Dina Ting, Basit Amin, Hailey Harris, Joe Diederich. Together, they manage a total of 32 strategies, with solid long-term prospects. The strategies average a Bronze asset-weighted Morningstar Medalist Rating, indicating a position 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.

Average

People

Franklin Templeton Investments, the asset-management arm of publicly traded but family managed Franklin Resources BEN, has been busy with acquisitions. The struggle in streamlining these disparate capabilities underpins its Average Parent rating. 
Franklin’s July 2020 acquisition of multiboutique manager Legg Mason remains its largest as of March 2023, but the firm has continued to grow through acquisitions. Its April 2022 and November 2022 purchases of Lexington Partners and Alcentra, respectively, make it one of world’s largest managers of alternative investments (with alts comprising USD 231 billion of its USD 1.4 trillion assets under management as of December 2022), while its July 2022 acquisition of O’Shaughnessy Asset Management adds a novel direct-indexing capability to its managed account offerings. These purchases, however, do little to alleviate the operational complexity of a firm with dozens of investment teams split by asset class, region, and investment platform.   
Although there are several standout strategies at the firm, many teams have struggled with personnel turnover, succession challenges, and unappealing performance patterns. Shepherding these geographically disparate capabilities, which have varying levels of centralization of distribution and risk management, shall be quite the challenge for the firm to manage.

Parent

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