ETF Talk: NOBL Holds Steady Through Market Volatility

“My success, part of it certainly, is that I have focused in on a few things.”

— Bill Gates

To really get something right, you must focus on it completely. Today’s ETF covers a fund that truly dedicates itself to one cause, making it a leader of smart-beta exchange-traded funds and the tracking of a market index.

ProShares S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats ETF (NOBL) is the only exchange-traded fund (ETF) exclusively focusing on the S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats Index. The fund is designed to measure the performance of companies in the S&P 500 Index who have paid and raised dividends for at least 25 years. Many of the companies in NOBL have been doing so for over 40 years.

NOBL is one of the largest ETFs in the Style Box — Large Cap Value. The fund’s largest allocation is in the industrials sector, making up about 23.5% of the portfolio’s holdings. Consumer Defensive is the second-largest allocation.

NOBL has traded between $90.85 and $108.47 this year. Its roughly 70 holdings provide proper diversification in the fund. The fund has net assets of more than $11.6 billion and a yield of 2.07%. It has an expense ratio of 0.35%. NOBL rose 0.89% in the last month, dipped .90% over the last three months and climbed 2.18% for the year to date.

The top 10 holdings account for about 17% of the portfolio and include Emerson Electric Co. (1.83%), Caterpillar (1.82%), Franklin Resources, Inc. (1.8%), Cardinal Health (1.73%), International Business Machines Corporation (1.66%), Pentair (1.62%), Nordson Corporation (1.61%), Nucor Corporation (1.6%), Stanley Black and Decker, Inc. (1.59%) and Ecolab Inc (1.57%).

Exclusive ETF Talk: Finding Value in Your Brokerage

Chart courtesy of www.Stockcharts.com.

NOBL’s strategy to include companies with over 25 years of dividend raises and growth makes it a strong and resilient force in times of volatility in the market.

While newer technology can cement a place in other funds and indexes, companies publicly traded after 1990 cannot join NOBL. The fund remains stable through times of instability because each holding has proved itself to be growth-oriented for decades. The strength of the holdings is what makes NOBL such a formidable ETF.

However, don’t rely solely on a quick summary for a thorough analysis of the fund. Investors should always do their due diligence before adding any stock, fund or ETF to their portfolio.

As always, I am happy to answer any of your questions about ETFs, so do not hesitate to send me an email. You just may see your question answered in a future ETF Talk.

Jim Woods

Jim Woods is a 20-plus-year veteran of the markets with varied experience as a broker, hedge fund trader, financial writer, author and newsletter editor. Jim is the editor of Forecasts & Strategies, Tactical Trader, TNT Trader, Five Star Trader, Bullseye Stock Trader, and The Deep Woods. His books include co-authoring, “Billion Dollar Green: Profit from the Eco Revolution,” and “The Wealth Shield: How to Invest and Protect Your Money from Another Stock Market Crash, Financial Crisis or Global Economic Collapse.” He’s also ghostwritten many books and articles, as well as edited content for some of the investment industry’s biggest luminaries. His articles have appeared on many leading financial websites, including StockInvestor.com, InvestorPlace.com, Main Street Investor, MarketWatch, Street Authority, Human Events and many others. Jim formerly worked with Investor’s Business Daily founder William J. O’Neil, helping to author training courses in the CANSLIM stock-picking methodology. The independent firm TipRanks rates Jim the No. 3 financial blogger in the world (out of more than 6,000). TipRanks calculates that, since 2012, he's made 361 successful recommendations out of 499 total, earning a success rate of 72% and a +15.3% average return per recommendation. He is known in professional and personal circles as “The Renaissance Man,” because his expertise includes such varied fields as composing and performing music; Western horsemanship, combat marksmanship, martial arts, auto racing and bodybuilding. Jim holds a BA in philosophy from the University of California, Los Angeles, and is a former U.S. Army paratrooper. A self-described “radical for capitalism,” he celebrates the virtue of making money from his Southern California horse ranch.