DUSG vs SAWS

DUSGAU.S. Small Cap Growth Portfolio: ETF Class Shares

SAWSCAAM Sawgrass U.S. Small Cap Quality Growth ETF

In short

DUSG A Dimensional small-cap growth strategy that finally got a ticker. DUSG is an exchange-traded share class of a portfolio running since 2012, screening small US companies for high profitability and cheaper relative price.

SAWS Most small-cap funds are built to chase the upside. SAWS writes the other half into its mandate: the prospectus objective names downside protection and low standard deviation alongside growth, pursued through an active, multi-screen model.

Stated mandate

DUSG The Portfolio seeks long-term capital appreciation.

SAWS The Fund seeks risk-adjusted returns, upside participation, downside protection, low standard deviation, and long-term capital appreciation.

Why people hold it

• DUSG Not a startup fund with a launch-day portfolio. The underlying strategy has run since 2012, and the ETF class is a new door into the same book of stocks.businesswire.com
• The screen does two jobs at once: small-cap growth companies, filtered for high profitability and lower relative price, instead of whatever the index says is popular.dimensional.com
• 0.33% a year for a systematically managed factor strategy, sitting right around the middle of the multifactor pack rather than at the premium end.
• Broad and diversified by design, holding a wide sweep of US small caps in a billion-dollar-plus portfolio, not a handful of high-conviction names.dimensional.com

• SAWS The mandate is unusually specific for a small-cap fund: risk-adjusted returns, upside participation, downside protection and low standard deviation, and the portfolio has tracked that description closely.
• Five screens stacked into one small-cap sleeve: quality, profitability, value, momentum and low volatility, blended by a proprietary model rather than an off-the-shelf index.
• At 0.55% a year, active stock selection priced close to the middle of the active small-cap field rather than at a premium to it.

Worth knowing

• DUSG It trades thinly. Light volume can mean wider gaps between the bid and the ask than you get with the household-name index ETFs.
• Distributions land once or twice a year, not monthly. The stated job here is long-term capital appreciation, not a paycheck.
• Fair pricing, not bargain pricing: broad US growth exposure in the same peer group costs far less (IUSG, 0.04%), minus the small-cap and profitability screens.

• SAWS A small fund that trades lightly. Bid-ask spreads can be wide, and that cost lands in your fill price, most visibly on bigger orders.
• Launched in 2024, so the record is short and covers one market regime. No full drawdown cycle yet to test the downside-protection half of the mandate.
• Bigger systematic rivals such as AVUV, AVSC and DUHP charge 0.20% to 0.29% and stand higher in the cohort; SAWS sits in the lower half of its peer group.

Full DUSG profile⁠

Full SAWS profile⁠