EMTY vs PSQ

EMTYCProShares Decline of the Retail Store ETF

PSQBProShares Short QQQ

In short

EMTY A short bet with a storyline. EMTY moves inverse to a basket of bricks-and-mortar retailers and resets daily. In a bear-fund crowd built on stock indexes, currencies and volatility, it is the one aimed at a single real-world theme.

PSQ The plain short on the Nasdaq-100: PSQ aims for -1x the index's daily move, with no leverage multiplier bolted on. It has been running since 2006, making it one of the original one-for-one bear tools.

Stated mandate

EMTY The fund seeks capital appreciation from declines in bricks-and-mortar retailers by taking short exposure to the Solactive-ProShares Bricks and Mortar Retail Store Index, targeting approximately the inverse of the index’s daily performance.

PSQ The fund is designed to provide -1x exposure to the Nasdaq-100 Index's daily price movement, seeking to benefit when that index declines.

Why people hold it

• EMTY Thematic, not index. The best-known names in its bear cohort short the Nasdaq (PSQ), the euro (EUO), the yen (YCS) or volatility (SVXY). This one points at physical retail stores.
• The fee is 0.65% a year, well under the typical charge in its inverse-fund cohort and under every fund at the top of that group.
• Running since 2017, so the mechanics have been through years of live retail news cycles rather than a backtest.

• PSQ ProShares bills it as the only -1x ETF built to profit when the Nasdaq-100's daily price falls. Sibling QID doubles the dose at -2x; PSQ stays one-for-one.proshares.com
• 0.95% net of a waiver through September 30, 2027 (0.96% gross), near the category median and the same net fee as -2x QID, also waived through September 30, 2027.
• Among the most actively traded funds in the bear category, and one of the closest to its stated daily target in a peer group of 50-plus funds.

Worth knowing

• EMTY Daily reset. Hold past a day and the result can drift from the simple inverse of the index over that stretch, most of all in choppy, back-and-forth markets.
• Small and thinly traded. Spreads can widen, the trade price can sit away from net asset value, and funds with a modest asset base get closed or merged more often than large ones.
• One idea, one corner of the market. There is no diversification cushion here. The fortunes of bricks-and-mortar retailers drive the whole thing.

• PSQ The -1x goal resets daily. Over weeks or months, compounding means results can differ from -1x the index's move across that stretch, especially in choppy markets.sec.gov
• Cheap for this corner of the market, pricey next to a broad index fund. The fee accrues every day you hold it, hedge or trade.
• It cuts one way: when the Nasdaq-100 rises on the day, PSQ is designed to fall roughly in step.

Full EMTY profile⁠

Full PSQ profile⁠