A sound investment process and strong management team underpin Xtrackers MSCI USA Clmt Actn Eq 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 sensible investment philosophy merits a High Process Pillar rating. Independent of the rating, analysis of the strategy's portfolio shows it has maintained an overweight in liquidity exposure and volatility exposure compared with category peers. High liquidity exposure is attributed to stocks with a high trading volume, lending managers more flexibility. And high volatility exposure is rooted in stocks that have a higher 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 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 index on a risk-adjusted basis over the long term. Xtrackers MSCI USA Clmt Actn Eq ETF earns a High Process Pillar rating. The leading factor in the rating is that this fund tracks an index. Historical data, such as Morningstar's Active/Passive Barometer, finds that passively managed funds have generally outperformed their active counterparts, especially over longer time horizons. The parent firm's five-year risk-adjusted success ratio of 59% also contributes to the process. 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. Their relatively high success ratio suggests that the firm does well for investors and that this fund may benefit from that. The parent firm's strong risk-adjusted performance, as shown by its average 10-year Morningstar Rating of 3.2 stars, supports the process as well.

The investment strategy as stated in the fund's prospectus is:  The investment seeks investment results that correspond generally to the performance, before fees and expenses, of the MSCI USA Climate Action Index.  The fund, using a “passive” or indexing investment approach, seeks investment results that correspond generally to the performance, before fees and expenses, of the underlying index, and which is comprised of large and mid-capitalization companies in the United States that the underlying index’s methodology assesses as leading their sector peers in taking action relating to a climate transition. The fund will invest at least 80% of its total assets in component securities of the index. The fund is non-diversified. 

 The portfolio is overweight in communication services by 3.3 percentage points in terms of assets compared with the category average, and its consumer cyclical allocation is similar to the category. The sectors with low exposure compared to category peers are industrials and financial services, with industrials underweighting the average portfolio by 3.8 percentage points of assets and financial services similar to the average. The portfolio is composed of 311 holdings and its assets are more dispersed than the typical peer in the category. In the most recent disclosure, 33.6% of the strategy's assets were concentrated in the top 10 fund holdings, as opposed to the category average's 49.5%. And finally, in terms of portfolio turnover, this fund trades less regularly than the typical peer in its category, which may result in a lower cost to investors.

High

Process

Xtrackers’s team is strong compared with others in the industry, resulting in an Above Average People Pillar rating. There are four managers listed on the fund: Patrick Dwyer, Shlomo Bassous, Bryan Richards, Ashif Shaikh. Experience on the team is abundant, with 17 years of average portfolio management experience. Together, they manage a total of 29 strategies, with a Silver asset-weighted average Morningstar Medalist Rating, indicating the 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.

Above Average

People

In the past two years, DWS has been under heavy scrutiny from the SEC and German authorities owing to greenwashing allegations that were initially raised in August 2021 by the firm’s former chief sustainability officer Desiree Fixler. The SEC announced on Sept. 25, 2023, that it has fined DWS USD 19 million for failing to implement procedures to ensure that all investment staff members were following its environmental, social, and governance policies. This relates to funds where ESG factors were analyzed alongside other financially material factors, but where managers retained discretion over ESG outcomes. In addition, the firm was ordered to pay USD 6 million for deficiencies in its anti-money-laundering processes that were uncovered in a separate investigation. The investigation by the German authorities into the firm's ESG disclosures is still ongoing.  
The SEC findings underline that despite strong senior management commitment, it takes a considerable amount of time and resources to embed sustainability across all levels of an organization for firms without a long-standing sustainability heritage. Overconfidence and failure to deal with internal criticism adequately appear to have contributed to DWS' misleading statements on ESG matters. While it's difficult to quantify the financial damage to clients and no misstatements were detected in financial disclosures or prospectuses, we believe the firm’s shortcomings have the potential to adversely affect investor outcomes. Hence, we welcome DWS' efforts to strengthen governance around ESG integration and communicate more conservatively about its ESG capabilities.
Questionable and unsteady leadership has contributed to the DWS' woes. Previous CEO Asoka Woehrmann, who had spearheaded the firm's ESG push, stepped down in June 2022 as a result of the ESG investigations. His credibility had already been harmed following his use of personal email for business purposes and a large payment made to him by a client when he was head of Deutsche Bank's private-client business before being appointed as DWS' CEO in 2018. His successor Stefan Hoops is the firm's sixth CEO in the past 10 years, highlighting the instability in the firm's top leadership. This appointment also shows the continued influence of its parent company, even after the partial IPO in 2018. Hoops has spent most of his career at Deutsche Bank but has no asset-management background.
Despite all these negative headlines and shaky leadership, DWS has managed to remain quite stable in its investment ranks. The firm has also made strides to gain greater independence. For example, since 2020, bonuses have been linked to the firm's own performance rather than to that of the bank as a whole, which supports alignment and talent retention. Variable remuneration takes into account performance of up to five years.
DWS' vast fund lineup covers all asset classes, including passive strategies, which are offered under the Xtrackers brand. Many offerings don't distinguish themselves, but there are genuine areas of strength among active strategies, and fees are competitive across many funds. While the product development process has been streamlined, and although the firm has launched new strategies at a slower pace, lineup turnover remains a concern as a culture of asset-gathering prevails. New offerings are partly related to an expansion of ESG capabilities, but the firm is also building out its thematic equity, multi-asset, alternatives, and exchange-traded fund range. 
At this stage, we continue to believe that DWS' strengths justify a Parent Pillar rating of Average despite several weaknesses in its stewardship practices, but we will closely monitor the company for further disruption.

Average

Parent

Xtrackers MSCI USA Climate Action Equity ETF

USCA tracks a market cap-weighted index of large- and mid-cap US stocks, selected as a leader in their respective GICS sector for emphasizing climate-friendly objectives. The process screens securities based on ESG research from MSCI.

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However, the fund in question takes a climate-focused rather than a broad ESG approach.

DWS' $2B ETF Launch Is History Repeating Itself

DWS announced the listing of the Xtrackers MSCI USA Climate Action Equity ETF (NYSE Arca: USCA), which seeks exposure to companies leading the way towards a low-carbon economy. The fund received an investment of approximately $2 billion on the first day of trading, making it the largest ETF launch of all time in the U.S.

New Xtrackers Climate Action ETF Launches With $2 Billion

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--DWS, one of the world's leading asset managers, announced today the listing of Xtrackers MSCI USA Climate Action Equity ETF (NYSE: USCA) (the “Fund”). The Fund is designed for investors seeking exposure to large and mid-cap companies in the United States that are leading their sector peers in taking actions relating to climate transition.

News for Xtrackers MSCI USA Climate Action Equity ETF ETF (USCA)