July 7, 2021

Professor published in one of America's most prestigious business law journals

Professor Ryan Clements has published an article in the Virginia Law & Business Review.

"Exchange-Traded Confusion: How Industry Practices Undermine Product Comparisons in Exchange Traded Funds" is the first scholarly work, amongst a growing body of ETF studies, to illustrate why accurate “apples to apples” product comparisons in ETFs are so challenging (at times even impossible) to perform. This article presents a variety of ETF case studies to demonstrate this challenge, including recent performance instabilities during the coronavirus pandemic.

This article advocates for continued positive momentum around investor focused reforms in ETFs, building on encouraging steps undertaken by the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission in its recent “Rule 6c-11” under the Investment Company Act of 1940. Finally, this article makes several recommendations to improve ETF product comparisons including standardizing website formats and layouts for information presentation, uniform calculation methodologies of key ETF variables, an ETF naming convention, and standard terms in sustainable investing. 

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