ETF Opportunities Trust files a stock ETF that may go entirely to cash in extremes
ETF Opportunities Trust on Thursday, October 1, 2026, filed to register the Airo Bellwether ETF, a proposed active fund with a 1.00% annual fee and no ticker yet.
Key takeaways
ETF Opportunities Trust filed on Thursday to register the Airo Bellwether ETF, a proposed stock fund that may move entirely into cash in extreme market conditions.
The prospectus is not finished, and the ticker and the exchange are blank. The cover proposes to make the filing effective 75 days after it was filed, a date that falls on Tuesday, December 15, 2026. The shares cannot be sold until the registration is effective.
Airo Capital Management LLC, the proposed adviser, is a Delaware firm organized in September 2026 and based in Atlantic Beach, Florida. Craig R. Ballard, Airo's chief investment officer, would be the portfolio manager. The filing says he also manages other accounts, then leaves the counts, the assets and the date blank.
Ballard's model assigns probabilities, from current market data, to five states the adviser calls rebound, bull, caution, defensive and crisis. Under normal conditions the fund would seek long-term capital appreciation in common stocks of large U.S. companies, and only in stocks in the Russell 1000 at the time of purchase.
Treasury bills and other cash compete with those stocks each time the portfolio is rebuilt. Going entirely to cash is allowed only in extreme market conditions, where the model finds that no eligible stock offers enough return for the risk. The fund may then hold a substantial part of its assets in cash, and potentially all of them.
The filing calls that a temporary defensive position and says the fund returns to stocks as the model finds eligible ones. It also says a large cash holding can work against the objective when stocks are rising.
The prospectus sets the fee at 1.00% of average daily net assets, with no exception for cash. If the fund sits in Treasury bills, the 1.00% still applies to the whole fund.
Airo would pay the fund's other operating costs itself. Interest, taxes, fees of any funds the portfolio holds, and brokerage commissions are not in the 1.00%. They stay in the fund and come out of what a holder owns.
A reader who already wants large U.S. stocks with a built-in move into Treasury bills can hold the Pacer Trendpilot US Large Cap ETF PTLC, which tracks an index that switches between equities and three-month Treasury bills. It charges 0.6%, launched in 2015, and held $3.3 billion as of September 29. The proposed fee is 0.4 percentage points higher, and Pacer follows an index while this fund would be actively managed.
Each rebuild would cap any single stock at 12% of the portfolio and any single sector or theme at 45%. The fund would normally hold at least 25 stocks, except in that extreme case.
A buyer would pay 1.00% to a firm organized in September 2026 for a model with permission to sit entirely in cash in extreme market conditions.
ETFs in this story
Frequently asked questions
When can this fund go entirely to cash?
Only in extreme market conditions, when the model finds that no eligible stock offers enough return for the risk.
What would it hold the rest of the time?
Under normal conditions it would hold common stocks of large U.S. companies, and only stocks in the Russell 1000 at the time of purchase.
Does the fee drop if the fund sits in cash?
No: the fee is 1.00% of average daily net assets, with no exception for cash.
When could shares be sold?
Not until the registration is effective, a date the cover proposes as Tuesday, December 15, 2026.
