FFTY vs PTLC

FFTYDCapForce IBD 50 ETF

PTLCAPacer Trendpilot US Large Cap ETF

In short

FFTY Investor's Business Daily's IBD 50 stock list, wrapped in a fund. A computer rescreens the growth leaders every week, and a market-signal rule can shift half the index into Treasury bills.

PTLC Most index funds ride out every drawdown. PTLC tracks an index with an exit ramp: a rules-based trend signal that shifts its large-cap exposure toward 3-month Treasury bills and back, with no manager judgment in the loop.

Stated mandate

FFTY The Fund aims to deliver the performance of the IBD 50 Index before fees and expenses.

PTLC The Fund seeks to track the total return performance, before fees and expenses, of the Pacer Trendpilot US Large Cap Index. That index uses a rules-based trend-following approach that alternates exposure between equities and 3-Month US Treasury bills.

Why people hold it

• FFTY The portfolio is rebuilt weekly against an 11-factor growth and technical screen, so fading names drop out in days rather than waiting on a quarterly review.sec.gov
• Built-in defensive gear: on certain market-wide signals, the index moves half its weight into Treasury bills at the next reconstitution and stays there until a reversal signal.sec.govsec.gov 2
• Concentrated on purpose. About 50 names, weighted by rank, so the highest-scoring stocks carry real weight instead of being diluted across hundreds of positions.sec.gov
• Want the IBD 50 as a fund? This is the only wrapper for it. No other ETF in the category tracks the same declared index.

• PTLC The switch is mechanical. A rules-based trend signal alternates exposure between US large-cap equities and 3-month Treasury bills, so nobody is making a gut call mid-panic.paceretfs.com
• Underneath the signal sits plain large-cap America: roughly 500 stocks benchmarked to the S&P 500, not a niche factor slice.paceretfs.com
• Trading since 2015 and now a multi-billion-dollar fund, so the rules have run through live markets, not just backtests.
• Among the index-tracking funds we cover, it lands in the upper half, and it follows its own index closely.

Worth knowing

• FFTY The fee is 1.03%, above the category median, with no waiver currently reducing it. Trend peers such as WAMA (0.32%) and PTLC (0.60%) charge less.
• The prospectus itself flags that weekly rebalancing drives higher turnover than similar funds, which tends to mean more trading friction and taxable gains.sec.gov
• Thinly traded and small in assets next to the category's giants, so spreads and limit orders matter more at the point of entry and exit.

• PTLC 0.60% a year is real money next to vanilla large-cap trackers like SCHK (0.03%) or VOOV (0.07%). The trend rules are what the extra buys.
• Trend signals read past prices. Moves into T-bills, or back into stocks, arrive after a market shift is already underway rather than ahead of it.
• Distributions land once or twice a year, so it isn't structured as a steady income drip.

Full FFTY profile⁠

Full PTLC profile⁠