EMCS vs EMXF

EMCSAXtrackers MSCI Emerging Markets Climate Selection ETF

EMXFAiShares ESG Advanced MSCI EM ETF

In short

EMCS A screened take on emerging markets at core-tracker pricing: 0.15% a year for roughly 70 names carved out of a global selection index. Cheap enough to sit beside the plain-vanilla EM giants, narrow enough to look nothing like them.

EMXF The strict end of ESG in emerging markets. EMXF follows an index that demands stronger ESG ratings, screens out a long list of controversial businesses, and caps any single issuer at 5% so no one giant runs the show.

Stated mandate

EMCS The fund seeks results generally corresponding, before fees and expenses, to the performance of its MSCI climate-selection index. The index represents large- and mid-capitalization companies across emerging-market countries and applies ESG and climate screens.

EMXF The fund is designed to follow an emerging-market equity index that emphasizes stronger ESG ratings and applies extensive screens to controversial business activities.

Why people hold it

• EMCS Costs 0.15% a year, well under the roughly 0.66% median for its EM index peer group and a fraction of EEM's 0.72%.
• Rules-based mandate, no discretion bolted on: it takes the emerging-market slice of a roughly 500-stock global selection index screened on climate and ESG criteria.sec.gov
• Concentrated on purpose: roughly 70 large- and mid-cap names instead of the several hundred in broad EM benchmarks, so the screens actually show up in the portfolio.
• Live since 2018 and one of the stronger implementations in its MSCI emerging-markets peer group.

• EMXF The "Advanced" label means deep screening: an index built on stronger ESG ratings plus extensive exclusions for controversial business activities, not one or two token cuts.ishares.com
• The index caps each issuer at 5%, which matters in emerging markets, where plain cap-weighted portfolios lean hard on a few chip and tech behemoths.ishares.com
• 0.16% a year is modest for a heavily screened fund, and it sits below the typical expense ratio in its emerging-markets peer group.
• Roughly 600 large and mid caps across emerging markets: the screens trim the field without collapsing it into a concentrated handful of names.

Worth knowing

• EMCS Thinly traded next to the EM heavyweights like IEMG and EEM, so spreads can run wider and larger orders push the price around more.
• Renamed twice since launch (ESG Leaders, then Climate Selection, now Select), each time with index and objective changes. Read the current prospectus, not the old ticker's story.dws.com
• Cash comes once or twice a year rather than monthly, and a portfolio this narrow can drift from broad EM returns in either direction.

• EMXF Unscreened emerging-markets trackers such as VWO and SCHE run at a fraction of this expense ratio. The screening is what you are paying for.
• A smaller, thinly traded fund. Spreads can widen, so the price on screen and the price you get are not always the same thing.
• Cutting whole slices of the emerging-markets universe means this portfolio can look and behave quite differently from a standard EM index, in either direction.

Full EMCS profile⁠

Full EMXF profile⁠