EMCS vs NUEM

EMCSAXtrackers MSCI Emerging Markets Climate Selection ETF

NUEMBNuveen ESG Emerging Markets Equity 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.

NUEM Most ESG emerging-market funds license an MSCI screen. NUEM runs TIAA's own index instead, cutting to roughly 190 names rather than shaving a few off the broad benchmark.

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.

NUEM The fund seeks to track, before fees and expenses, the TIAA ESG Emerging Markets Equity Index. That index consists of listed equity securities and related depositary receipts from emerging-market countries whose issuers meet specified ESG criteria.

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.

• NUEM Tracks the TIAA ESG Emerging Markets Equity Index, an in-house rulebook, while the biggest names in the group (ESGE, LDEM, EEMX) all run MSCI screens.
• Roughly 190 stocks, so the ESG screen actually bites: a filtered slice of emerging markets, not the whole index with a light green tint.
• Running since 2017, and its holdings line up with the ESG emerging-markets mandate spelled out in its prospectus. No mission drift.

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.

• NUEM At 0.36% the fee sits at the middle of this group, above LDEM at 0.16% and ESGE at 0.25%.
• Thinly traded, so bid-ask spreads can widen and the fill on a market order can sit away from the fund's underlying value.
• Distributions arrive once or twice a year, not monthly.

Full EMCS profile⁠

Full NUEM profile⁠